Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, welcome. You're listening to Jay's analysis, and we
Speaker 1: are going live. Gonna let the audience trickle in here
Speaker 1: a little bit, see if we can build up a
Speaker 1: little bit of watch your viewership listenership. Excuse me before
Speaker 1: we actually get going with the debate, before I send him, No,
Speaker 1: we're not late. I'm just I'm on the road, so
Speaker 1: I'm at a bit of a disadvantage. I don't have
Speaker 1: my library with me, and I'm not really familiar with
Speaker 1: mister fun doctor Feeld. Actually he we have mutual friends.
Speaker 1: I've been friends with some guys for about a decade
Speaker 1: that set this up, and I'm glad to do this
Speaker 1: because it's been so long since I've done it, real
Speaker 1: debate with a trained person and these kinds of ideas.
Speaker 1: You know, we get the internet philosophers, but we don't
Speaker 1: often get trained academic types. So I'm going to send
Speaker 1: him the link now, and I'm gonna be going from
Speaker 1: memory here. I've got some of my articles pulled up
Speaker 1: because I'm on the road, but I didn't want to
Speaker 1: say no to this debate, and if need be, we
Speaker 1: may down the road have successive debates that deal with
Speaker 1: you know, maybe questions that get raised in this debate. Right, So,
Speaker 1: since I'm on the road, I don't have my sumo
Speaker 1: with me, I don't have the Sumo countries and TLAs,
Speaker 1: I don't have my thmistic commentaries. I'm going to be
Speaker 1: going from memory. And but again, it's not that hard
Speaker 1: to know what Thomas's doctrin of divine simplicity is. It's
Speaker 1: pretty clearly stated multiple times in Volume one of the
Speaker 1: sum and in Volume one of the Super Countridge and
Speaker 1: Tea Lace. So I've sent him the link, so he
Speaker 1: should be coming in pretty soon, and I imagine it
Speaker 1: will be a pretty pretty laid back debate. Doctor fine Gold,
Speaker 1: How are you good? How are you? Mister Dyer? You jay? Okay?
Speaker 1: That's cool. Thanks for doing the debate, man, how are you?
Speaker 1: I'm doing all right.
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me on. It's an honor.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I appreciate justin putting it together. I know he
Speaker 1: was kind of looking for somebody to do a debate
Speaker 1: for a while, and I think you would be a
Speaker 1: perfect category or a perfect person for this category. You
Speaker 1: you want to tell us a little bit about yourself
Speaker 1: and your research, and that you I think you did
Speaker 1: your dissertation on Thomas right, sure, yeah.
Speaker 2: So my dissertation, which I defined it last November, was
Speaker 2: on divine impass ability in aquitness, so specifically trying to
Speaker 2: deal with the problem of how to reconcile standard to
Speaker 2: missing doctrines like pure actuality and divine simplicity with the
Speaker 2: dependence of the love of the love around the beloved,
Speaker 2: which seems to imply passibility. And are you still there?
Speaker 1: Because yeah, you know, you might want to cut your
Speaker 1: camera off because it's good, it'll use a lot of bandwidth,
Speaker 1: and we might want to audio.
Speaker 2: Let's see if I can figure out how to do that.
Speaker 1: There we go, Yeah, yeah, that'll probably be a little smoother.
Speaker 1: Now sounds good. And I want to add two to
Speaker 1: the audience that we will will be taking we are
Speaker 1: you cool taking questions? Of course? Okay, so people in
Speaker 1: the audience, if you want to do super chat questions,
Speaker 1: will take those. As usual, I always split the super
Speaker 1: chats with the guests, so doctor fine Gold will get
Speaker 1: half of the super chat questions that you guys ask,
Speaker 1: So come up with some good ones. As we discuss here,
Speaker 1: I'm thinking maybe we could do a pretty free flowing
Speaker 1: conversation style doesn't have to be formal debate, mainly because
Speaker 1: I'm not at my library, so I'm on the road
Speaker 1: and I'm kind of going from memory. You have the
Speaker 1: home court advantage all sort of. I just have my laptops.
Speaker 1: But okay, well that's fine, so I'll do you How
Speaker 1: do we want to start this off? Do you want to? Uh,
Speaker 1: let me ask you? Are you are you very familiar
Speaker 1: with Eastern theology or like the Eastern.
Speaker 2: Now I can't claim a lot of familiarity. I have
Speaker 2: a couple of paragraphs on Pollens and my dissertation, but
Speaker 2: that's about it. So if you want to, maybe it
Speaker 2: would be good to do something like this where you
Speaker 2: give the basic polem my position, which I take it
Speaker 2: you'll be defending. I'll give the basic elevator pitch for aquitness,
Speaker 2: and then we can start probing.
Speaker 1: Sure, so I'll start off by saying that the Palamite
Speaker 1: position actually isn't the the position just of San Palamas.
Speaker 1: In fact, it's a doctrine that I would say pretty
Speaker 1: clearly as taught in Saint Bezols letter two thirty four,
Speaker 1: where he exp makes the distinction between the essence and energy,
Speaker 1: or the essence and the operations of God. If we
Speaker 1: look at Saint John Damascus's Orthodox Faith in multiple times
Speaker 1: throughout the work he makes the distinction between the essence
Speaker 1: and energy of God. Of course, in book one he
Speaker 1: will say that the energy of God is one, and
Speaker 1: then he goes on to say that the energy of
Speaker 1: God is also multiple. For us, that's a one in
Speaker 1: the many questions where we don't actually see a dialectic,
Speaker 1: but in fact the energies of God are or actions
Speaker 1: of God are multiple. And later on on the Orthodox
Speaker 1: Faith he even clarifies this in a more intense way
Speaker 1: when he talks about the energies in Christ and the Incarnation,
Speaker 1: specifically the relationship between the two natural wills and operations
Speaker 1: or energies in the two natures. This, of course is
Speaker 1: because the six that Conical Council dealt extensively with debating
Speaker 1: the Mono Thelites on the question of Christ and the
Speaker 1: Incarnation having two wills and two energy's property to the
Speaker 1: proper to those natures. So I would argue, as Saint
Speaker 1: Gregory Palamas does against Barlam, and as Saint Gregor sat
Speaker 1: Maximus the Confessor did against against Paris the Mono Thelite,
Speaker 1: that the nature grace question and the question of the
Speaker 1: essence and energies distinction in the incarnation is even clearer
Speaker 1: when we understand that there's no dialectics. So there's no
Speaker 1: dialectics in the relationship between nature and grace. There's no
Speaker 1: dialectics between the relationship of Christ's human nature and energy
Speaker 1: participating in the divine nature and energy. So, in other words,
Speaker 1: the uncreated energies of God. It's not just a question
Speaker 1: of God's relationship to creation, but it's also solidified dogmatically
Speaker 1: and theologically in the sixth Ecumenical Council when it deals
Speaker 1: with this specific question. If you read the debate between
Speaker 1: Saint Maximus and Puris, you'll see that Maximus relies throughout
Speaker 1: in that one hundred and fifty page treatise on this
Speaker 1: being a real distinction. This real distinction allows for God
Speaker 1: to remain transcend it in his essence and yet come
Speaker 1: down to us and allow us to participate in his
Speaker 1: uncreated glory and life. Jesus says in John seventeen that
Speaker 1: he came to give us the same glory that he
Speaker 1: shares with the Father from all eternity. That glory that
Speaker 1: light is not created, is in fact uncreated, and it's
Speaker 1: not something that just is postponed to an intellectual vision
Speaker 1: in the afterlife to be a tipic vision. And in fact,
Speaker 1: it is something that's participated in here and now, and
Speaker 1: we know that by the fact of the incarnation. In fact,
Speaker 1: when the Fathers at the six Ecumenical Council and at
Speaker 1: the fifth by the way, talk about the incarnation, they
Speaker 1: speak of the humanity of Christ as being deified via
Speaker 1: the incarnation. Again, this process is done by the uncreated
Speaker 1: energies which proceed from the divine nature, certainly, although they're
Speaker 1: not the exact same as the divine nature. In our view,
Speaker 1: that is the that is the means by which the
Speaker 1: humanity of Christ participates in the divine life. That's explicitly
Speaker 1: stated quoting from Saint Gregor Nissa and Saint Gregor of
Speaker 1: Nazianzus and the theological orations at the fifth and sixth Council.
Speaker 1: So it's repeated, it's reaffirmed. We also have statements at
Speaker 1: the Council of Ephesus citing Saint Cyril of Alexandria Gisnastoria,
Speaker 1: so that the bread and wine in a similar way,
Speaker 1: participate in these divine energies. There are multiple references to
Speaker 1: these same ideas in the Liturgies of the East, all
Speaker 1: which talk about the operations of God. The baptismal right,
Speaker 1: for example, talks about calling down the energies of God
Speaker 1: into the baptismal font. And again it's all just based
Speaker 1: on our crystological understanding, which we see as again dogmatically
Speaker 1: stating in the sixth and fifth Council, that the energies
Speaker 1: deify the humanity. So that model of deification of Christ's
Speaker 1: humanity is the model for the individual believer, the individual
Speaker 1: baptized Christian, as they participate in God through the Church,
Speaker 1: through the sacraments, and that that participation is a real participation,
Speaker 1: but it's a participation in the uncreated glory, an uncreated light,
Speaker 1: uncreated grace of God, not a created grace. So I
Speaker 1: would contrast this with what's later dogmatized, so not just
Speaker 1: theoretically or philosophically speculated upon an aquinas in terms of
Speaker 1: how there might be a relationship between this absolutely simple
Speaker 1: essence and created beings, or this absolutely simple essence and
Speaker 1: the one person of the Trinity somehow becoming incarnate. Rather,
Speaker 1: it is the question of the Roman dogmas, and the
Speaker 1: Roman dogmas do eventually state. And I think I'm vindicating
Speaker 1: this by this, not just in my reading of what's
Speaker 1: that the Roman Council's, particularly like Tranth or Vatican One,
Speaker 1: where dogmatic divide simplicity has stated pretty clearly, you also
Speaker 1: have the outworkings of this in terms of created grace.
Speaker 1: You know, Trent has, if I recall, going from memory,
Speaker 1: a condemnation of different speculations about what kind of grace
Speaker 1: and justification is actually given in baptism, and one of
Speaker 1: the things that's condemned is the idea that it's not
Speaker 1: created grace. So, in other words, the grace that is
Speaker 1: stamped upon our soul, the sanctifying grace, is a created effect.
Speaker 1: And of course this is again in that sort of
Speaker 1: riscituentan causal format of God the cause, and then we
Speaker 1: receive the effects of that cause. But the effects that
Speaker 1: we receive are in fact created. And I would argue
Speaker 1: that the reason that Rome has this issue is precisely
Speaker 1: because eventually in the dogma, the uncreated created or excuse me,
Speaker 1: the uncreated grace, as his energy to sanctioned doctrine was
Speaker 1: eventually lost, so it was perfectly fine in terms of
Speaker 1: up into the sixth seventh eighth Council, if you count
Speaker 1: the eighth r eighth that is where it was stated explicitly.
Speaker 1: But it eventually, i would say, after the rise of
Speaker 1: Frankish dominance, Charlemagne, the Carolinians, you eventually have this dogma
Speaker 1: kind of being lost and forgotten. In Roman Catholic theology
Speaker 1: pretty much settles into a pretty ossified, solidified doctrine of
Speaker 1: what divine simplicity is. So there are a lot of errors.
Speaker 1: I'm going to close up here with this opening statement.
Speaker 1: I think that's the main the main point we would
Speaker 1: say that there's a lot of errors that kind of
Speaker 1: flow out of this that you can tease out. And
Speaker 1: so my first clarification is that I'm not debating whether
Speaker 1: Thomas had good intentions. I'm not debating whether Thomas in
Speaker 1: other places in the Suma said things correctly. I'm not
Speaker 1: here to debate Agustin's intentions or and some's intentions, but
Speaker 1: rather just specifically whether or not the things that are stated,
Speaker 1: say in book one of Syma Theologica and in book
Speaker 1: one of the Semlicuntries and Telaes about what divine simplicity
Speaker 1: is if that actually makes sense with and comports with
Speaker 1: what is stated elsewhere about how there is a real
Speaker 1: distinction of persons, because to us it doesn't seem that
Speaker 1: there could be a real distinction of persons if distinction
Speaker 1: implies composition or division. In fact, that's a direct borrowing
Speaker 1: from Plutonis, as Plutonis who first said will, following other
Speaker 1: Greek philosophers before him, that all consideration of distinction implies
Speaker 1: division or composition. And for us we see that as
Speaker 1: many times refuted, particularly in the christological heresies, but also
Speaker 1: in the triological triantological formations of the early Church. So
Speaker 1: for us, all of these questions are linked the doctrine
Speaker 1: of God how he relates to creation, also the doctrine
Speaker 1: of Christology, the doctrine of the sacraments, and the doctrine
Speaker 1: of eschatology, or all intimately connect an ecclesiology in terms
Speaker 1: of how we view the essence introducedinction and whether we
Speaker 1: believe that it's possible or not. So when it comes
Speaker 1: to Aquinas's conclusions, I'll say that for my later critique,
Speaker 1: given the fact that, for example, I don't see how
Speaker 1: creation can be a free action of God if we
Speaker 1: accept his doctrine of device simplicity, and the idea that
Speaker 1: all the actions of God are absolutely isomorphically identical to
Speaker 1: the essence of God. I don't see how we can
Speaker 1: say that there's a real incarnation if God is an
Speaker 1: absolutely simple essence, or for example, how we would avoid
Speaker 1: patropascianism if God is an absolutely simple essence. In other words,
Speaker 1: that one hypostasis of the trinity couldn't enter into a
Speaker 1: motive being that the others do not. So, for example,
Speaker 1: the Father is not crucified, the Father does not become incarnate,
Speaker 1: it's only the Son. But if God is an absolutely
Speaker 1: simple essence in which the distinctions implied composition of division,
Speaker 1: becomes difficult to see how there is a real nation,
Speaker 1: how God's actions within time and space are real actions
Speaker 1: signifying the divine power for as For example, it's common
Speaker 1: amount to the early Fathers to speak of Christ's human
Speaker 1: nature being evident when he cries or when he eats,
Speaker 1: But we see the Fathers also making a strong argument
Speaker 1: for the divine power operat in Christ or through Christ.
Speaker 1: When he walks on water, when he does miracles, when
Speaker 1: he raises the dead, those are actions proper to the
Speaker 1: divine nature, and they are real powers entering into time
Speaker 1: and space from the divine nature itself. Now we don't
Speaker 1: believe the divine nature interers into time and space, but
Speaker 1: in fact that is possible for the uncreated to enter
Speaker 1: into time and space because of our belief in the
Speaker 1: essence introduced sanction. And I'll close with I would say
Speaker 1: our strongest case in that regard is the fact that
Speaker 1: for us, the theophanies of the Old Testament up until
Speaker 1: Augustine in book three of On the Trinity is when
Speaker 1: it's first question. The Eastern Fathers never questioned the belief
Speaker 1: that it is not created holograms or angels that are present,
Speaker 1: for example in Exodus three in the Burning Bush, or
Speaker 1: in Exodus twenty three where God says I will put
Speaker 1: my name in my Angel, the Angel of the Lord.
Speaker 1: It is consistently believed that these theophanies are the pre
Speaker 1: incarnate presence of Christ himself. Tomism and Augustinian debates and
Speaker 1: discussions and on the Trinity and questioning of this led
Speaker 1: to the possibility that or led to the conclusion that
Speaker 1: it's difficult to see how an absolutely simple Trinitarian essence
Speaker 1: could manifest within time and space. Therefore, we have to
Speaker 1: accept that these are just angelic created forms. We don't
Speaker 1: believe that their Angela created forms, and neither do the
Speaker 1: church fathers who argue that these are these are this
Speaker 1: is the Logos manifesting within time and space. How is
Speaker 1: that possible? It's possible because of the essence energy distinction.
Speaker 1: So I will close with that and as my opening
Speaker 1: statement and let you let you speak.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, there's I had a bit there obviously,
Speaker 2: so maybe leaving something out, but it sounds as though
Speaker 2: we've got maybe five or six areas. You're powered right,
Speaker 2: So you've got I don't I don't know if you
Speaker 2: talked about this one explicitly, but you've got the distinction
Speaker 2: of attributes within God. You're going to have the problem
Speaker 2: of God's actions of respect to the world. You've got
Speaker 2: the problem of the trinity. You've got the problem of
Speaker 2: the hypostatic union and the communication of idioms. And you
Speaker 2: have the problem of nature and grace and what it
Speaker 2: means to say that we share in God's life. And
Speaker 2: I'm not all these are the same problem. So we
Speaker 2: should probably take those piece by piece, and I'll try
Speaker 2: to get to that in a minute. Since you did
Speaker 2: a little thing saying what you were clarifying is what
Speaker 2: you're trying to do and what you're not trying to do,
Speaker 2: I'll do a little bit of the same. So I'm
Speaker 2: not a theologian by trade, and my job. The thing
Speaker 2: what I'm trying to do here isn't primarily to make
Speaker 2: sense of council document so are the fathers. What I'm
Speaker 2: trying to do is to make sense of the coherence
Speaker 2: of Aquanus's doctrine of divine simplicity as best as I
Speaker 2: understand it, and I've messed around with the Trinity some
Speaker 2: I'm not an expert on the aquinus A theory of
Speaker 2: the hypostatic union, so what I'll be saying about that
Speaker 2: will be mostly guesswork, So I'm just throwing that out
Speaker 2: as Covey ads here.
Speaker 1: But yeah, and what.
Speaker 2: You said about impuning motivations, I thoroughly agree with that.
Speaker 2: I think we're both here to try to safeguard God's
Speaker 2: transcendence and try unity as best as we can. So
Speaker 2: let me start my elevator pitch, which I'll try to
Speaker 2: keep fairly short, just by explaining why somebody like Aquinas
Speaker 2: would find the doction of divine simplicity appealing, and then
Speaker 2: we can go over how in the context of that
Speaker 2: doctrine you try to make sense of the other things
Speaker 2: that you talked about. Does that sound good?
Speaker 1: Sure? Okay?
Speaker 2: So the basic reason for affirming divine simplicity it comes
Speaker 2: from affirming the philosophical and obviously a theological a doction
Speaker 2: of the first cause. What does it mean to say
Speaker 2: that there is a being who is absolutely first? What
Speaker 2: does it mean to say that there is a being which,
Speaker 2: unlike any being that we know of, it does not
Speaker 2: need a further explanation behind itself. So all Aquinas is
Speaker 2: famous proofs for God's existence, and this goes for Aristotle
Speaker 2: as well. Are going to argue from our experience in
Speaker 2: the created world of things which are a certain way
Speaker 2: that didn't have to be, and arguing from that to
Speaker 2: a cause which you might say, not to use aquitas
Speaker 2: own terms, but something which is the sufficient reason of
Speaker 2: its own being that way.
Speaker 1: Right, So the.
Speaker 2: Argument for emotion. We see things that change, we see
Speaker 2: things that move. What does that mean? That means we
Speaker 2: see something which was in potency becomes actualized and we
Speaker 2: want to figure out what on earth did it do
Speaker 2: that what's responsible for it's going from potency into act
Speaker 2: And you can say there was something else that actualized that.
Speaker 2: That's fine, but then you've got to ask the same
Speaker 2: question about it. Does it have an actualized potency? If so,
Speaker 2: what made that one actualize? And so you're going to
Speaker 2: keep on chasing that ball until you come up with
Speaker 2: something which has no potency but just it is pure actuality. Right,
Speaker 2: So that's the famous domestic doctrine of Actus Purus. Sure,
Speaker 2: I'm sure you're well familiar with and thinks that it's
Speaker 2: once you grant the pure act doctrine, in other words,
Speaker 2: that there is nothing there's nothing in God whose reality
Speaker 2: has to be explained by something outside of itself. There's
Speaker 2: nothing in God that could have been otherwise that was
Speaker 2: made to be the way is by something that wasn't itself.
Speaker 2: Once you grant that, Aquanus thinks that it's a short
Speaker 2: step to the doction of absolute simplicity. Because for Aquitas,
Speaker 2: whenever you have parts, where you're going to have is
Speaker 2: some sort of potency act relationship. Right, So when you
Speaker 2: have talking there are different kinds of parts. I'm not
Speaker 2: sure how familiar you are with Aquinas's myriology with the
Speaker 2: study of parts and holes. Right, So the most obvious
Speaker 2: kind of parts is going to be integral parts.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So like the bricks that make up a house.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So in the case of the bricks that make up
Speaker 2: a house, you've got actual, actually some mutual dependence relations going, right,
Speaker 2: because the house wouldn't be a house unless it was
Speaker 2: built up out of these parts. Right, So there's dependence there.
Speaker 2: But likewise, these bricks only actually count as what they
Speaker 2: are in the parts of the house because of their
Speaker 2: dependence on the whole. Right, yourselves are humans because they're
Speaker 2: part of your human body. And so with regular integral
Speaker 2: or quantitative parts as they're sometimes called, you're not going
Speaker 2: you don't want to predicate those of God, because then
Speaker 2: you'd be introducing potency into what by definition can't have it.
Speaker 2: If it did have it, then you'd have to ask
Speaker 2: what actualized the potency, and you want to have reached
Speaker 2: the actual first cause yet, So that's for integral parts.
Speaker 2: Usually what people are worried about, when at least people
Speaker 2: who grant that God's immaterial, what they're worried about when
Speaker 2: they object to divine simplicity isn't integral parts. It's usually
Speaker 2: going to be accidents, right, either the kind of accident
Speaker 2: which ionus would call extraneous accidents, which in us would
Speaker 2: be things like color and shape and size and all
Speaker 2: that stuff, or proper accidents, which for us would be
Speaker 2: things like the powers of our soul, things which we
Speaker 2: can't help about having given our nature. So why can't
Speaker 2: there be a multiplicity in God of those aquitness is
Speaker 2: basic answer here. It's going to be, well, anytime that
Speaker 2: you have a So there's a couple of different lines
Speaker 2: of argument.
Speaker 1: Here's why.
Speaker 2: Anytime that you have a subject and a feature of
Speaker 2: that subject, and so there's me, and there's my color
Speaker 2: that feature that accident makes the subject be in a
Speaker 2: certain way. In other words, me. It's just as a
Speaker 2: human being, I can be all sorts of different colors.
Speaker 2: I've got potency. And what the accident does is it
Speaker 2: actualizes that potency in a certain way, makes me be actually.
Speaker 1: Tan or whatever.
Speaker 2: And that would imply that what it does imply that
Speaker 2: what's being actualized is of itself potential. And so we
Speaker 2: don't want to predicate accidents of certainly of tenness or
Speaker 2: color of God, because among other things, he doesn't.
Speaker 1: Have a body.
Speaker 2: We don't want to predicate accidents of Wiz the more
Speaker 2: justice of God either, because again, that would be to
Speaker 2: imply that what God is the subject of which you're
Speaker 2: predicating these accidents lacked that actuality. And so the stimistic
Speaker 2: claims that when we say that God is wise, I'm
Speaker 2: not saying that there's an extra metaphysical reality which I'm
Speaker 2: plugging into the metaphysical reality, which is God. I'm rather
Speaker 2: saying that the metaphysical reality, which is God, I can
Speaker 2: capture a facet of that if you like, by my
Speaker 2: word wise. And so that's one line of argument, and
Speaker 2: that argument would be that if you were to say
Speaker 2: that God have an accident distinct from himself, then that
Speaker 2: would mean that this accident was actualizing God, unless that
Speaker 2: God was in potesy, unless that God could not be
Speaker 2: really the first cause, and that's wouldn't be God. The
Speaker 2: other line of argument would be, I call it the
Speaker 2: limiting line of argument. And so the idea would be this,
Speaker 2: once you gr and we'd have to do a couple
Speaker 2: more steps to show this, but once you grant that
Speaker 2: God is the fullness of existence.
Speaker 1: Right, So if you grant.
Speaker 2: The octus purus claim, and you also grant the EEPs
Speaker 2: from esse claim, and I can defend that if you like.
Speaker 2: Then you're saying that God is this pure fullness of
Speaker 2: existence of its itself, and to saying that the pure
Speaker 2: fullness of existence itself is something limited, which would be
Speaker 2: the case if I were to say that this pure
Speaker 2: fullness of existence itself had this little do a hickey
Speaker 2: attached to it called wisdom, which was different from it
Speaker 2: and different from these other attributes, then I would be saying,
Speaker 2: then the infinite and the pure and the what is
Speaker 2: pair se through itself is something limited and participated. And
Speaker 2: Aquanas thinks.
Speaker 1: That that's.
Speaker 2: Also in flat contradiction to the claim that God is
Speaker 2: the first cause in which all other things participate, but
Speaker 2: who himself participates in nothing. So I take it those
Speaker 2: are the two main lines of arguments against positing accidents
Speaker 2: really distinct from God in hearing in him. Now we
Speaker 2: would have to do a little bit of work to
Speaker 2: pair what you're calling energies with accidents one more thing,
Speaker 2: and then we can get into the trying to poke
Speaker 2: at the difficulties in each other's positions. So there's you
Speaker 2: talked about operations in particular, the word and urgeia obviously
Speaker 2: comes from the Greek word, which is most commonly used
Speaker 2: for operation. Rislotl uses it that way, although he also
Speaker 2: uses it sometimes to talk about form if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 2: And so there's this question of whether these arguments against
Speaker 2: divine accidents would also apply to arguments sorry would also
Speaker 2: apply to divine actions. Aquinas seems to think that they do.
Speaker 2: So he claps actions as a kind of accident, and
Speaker 2: so he wants to rule out all actions from God
Speaker 2: for the same reason. Then he rules out accident distinct
Speaker 2: accidents like justice and wisdom and mercy and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: It's not clear to me, So I'm.
Speaker 2: A bit of a heterodox Stonis. I'm putting my cards
Speaker 2: on the table here. It's not clear to me the
Speaker 2: actions and formal accidents should actually be considered on the
Speaker 2: same plane. I think you can make a principled case
Speaker 2: for allowing a real distinction of God's creature directed actions
Speaker 2: from himself in a way which you can't make a
Speaker 2: good argument for real distinction of his attributes from himself.
Speaker 2: And we can get into my crazy theories for why
Speaker 2: that's the case later. Okay, So that's my basic argument
Speaker 2: for a Quintus's position, as I understand it, should I
Speaker 2: try to go through the various theological points that you're
Speaker 2: bringing up, or do you want to speak to what
Speaker 2: I just said.
Speaker 1: Well, one thing I would say too in response is,
Speaker 1: at first, we do affirm that God is simple, every
Speaker 1: Orthodox doctrine, every Eastern father and all the fathers Western
Speaker 1: fathers as well. Right, consider, we all agree on simplicity.
Speaker 1: So it's not really a question of do we teach
Speaker 1: divine suplicity, but what in fact do we mean by that?
Speaker 1: For us? You know, one of the key theological treatises
Speaker 1: is on the Orthodox Faith, and of course Quita specifically
Speaker 1: deals with in his treatise on Divine Simplicity. He specifically
Speaker 1: deals with questions from John of Damascus right specifically on
Speaker 1: the essence synergy distinction. So sometimes in Orthodox theology, yes,
Speaker 1: operations inner gay that's actually used in the New Testament
Speaker 1: multiple times of divine activity, so it signifies the divine
Speaker 1: activity within time and space. But there's another important aspect
Speaker 1: that I should add to here that for Orthodox this
Speaker 1: actually solves a lot of the disputes between the East
Speaker 1: and the West over the filioque and trinitarian questions, which
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to get into that, but it is
Speaker 1: important to Germane to our discussion because we don't believe
Speaker 1: that that, you know, it's necessarily the case that there's
Speaker 1: only actions of God towards creation or eternity. Now, in
Speaker 1: a sense, yes there could be. I mean, there are
Speaker 1: those two things. But I want I'm trying to say
Speaker 1: is that we believe in a level of energetic manifestation.
Speaker 1: So for example, when many of the church fathers talk
Speaker 1: about the Spirit being manifested eternally from the Sun, that
Speaker 1: is that our doctrine signal, which is laid out at
Speaker 1: the Council of Black Herne as eternal manifestation. We see
Speaker 1: that as different from hypostatic origin of the spirit. So
Speaker 1: the reason I say that is because it's not just
Speaker 1: the Spirit eternally manifesting the sun and the Spirit resting
Speaker 1: in the sun, as Gregor Palomas and Saint John Damascus say.
Speaker 1: It's John Adamascus who makes this distinction between eternal manifestation
Speaker 1: and hypostatic origin. This is why Saint John doesn't teach
Speaker 1: the philioquay, and in fact he rejects. He says that
Speaker 1: there's no, there's no co cause or co producer of
Speaker 1: the Spirit other than the Father. The Son does eternally
Speaker 1: manifest the Spirit, and not just that the Son and
Speaker 1: the entire trinity manifests. In other words, all the trinitarian
Speaker 1: operations are from the Father through his Son and the Spirit,
Speaker 1: and this applies to eternal manifestation as well. So, for example,
Speaker 1: some attributes of God are appropriate to all eternity. God's
Speaker 1: love has eternally manifested for all eternity in that trinitarian way.
Speaker 1: God's God's goodness has eternally manifested that way. But some
Speaker 1: actions of God, as you said, are proper appropriate to
Speaker 1: time and space, to history. Saint Gregor Palamas and Saint
Speaker 1: Maximus make this distinction. They talk about how God's us as,
Speaker 1: for example, in relationship to Sodom and Gomor, that was
Speaker 1: something that occurred within time and space and passed away.
Speaker 1: Some of God's actions occur within time and space and
Speaker 1: continue on into eternity, for example, the creation of the church,
Speaker 1: setting up in the church, and so forth, the incarnation
Speaker 1: of Christ. These begin in time and space and they
Speaker 1: continue on into eternity. So not all actions of God
Speaker 1: are necessarily just related to the intertrinitarian life of God
Speaker 1: at intra or God at extra there's also for us
Speaker 1: a very important other level of energetic manifestation, which is
Speaker 1: a helpful distinction and actually explains what is it oftentimes
Speaker 1: confused in Rumman Catholic teaching on the philioquay. So I
Speaker 1: just wanted to add that caveat, and also the second
Speaker 1: caveat that we don't actually accept act as purists. So
Speaker 1: you began your opening statement by saying, well, if we
Speaker 1: accept the first cause argument and the actress purist position,
Speaker 1: then it does logically lead to these other things. And
Speaker 1: I would say, you're right, does We would agree with that. However,
Speaker 1: we just simply don't accept that starting point. And this
Speaker 1: is the thing that I think most Thomas don't question
Speaker 1: is what if we just question that starting point? What
Speaker 1: if we just reject which starting point, the Plutonian and
Speaker 1: the Originistic doctrine, the Greek doctrine, the Hellenic doctrine of
Speaker 1: what simplicity is. For example, Botonis and in the Ideods
Speaker 1: he says God is an absolutely simple intellectual essence. God
Speaker 1: is So.
Speaker 2: Sorry, hold on, because that's not the starting point. The
Speaker 2: starting point is just the notion of God is first cause?
Speaker 2: Is that what you're attacking.
Speaker 1: Well, what I'm saying is that you can reason back
Speaker 1: through to talking about a first cause. It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: whether you want. When we're talking about divine simplicity, the
Speaker 1: starting point is that that cause has to be absolutely simple.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not the starting point. The starting point is
Speaker 2: that there has to be a first cause, and we
Speaker 2: prove from or we try from the notion.
Speaker 1: Okay, but we have, but we have a completely different
Speaker 1: order theologia. We don't do that kind of a reasoning
Speaker 1: back to the first cause. That's an Aristotelian doctrine. Now,
Speaker 1: church fathers talk about a first cause, but we don't
Speaker 1: talk about reasoning back to the first cause. In order
Speaker 1: to get to a definition of God as simple and
Speaker 1: then lay later by SuperNature, we tackle on the person's
Speaker 1: orthodoxiology is completely reversed. It's the other way around. We
Speaker 1: start with revelation from God and Christ, and that's how
Speaker 1: we don't know naturally about God being a first cause
Speaker 1: and then later God having three persons. It begins with
Speaker 1: a personal revelation of I am that I am. This
Speaker 1: is why Saint Gregory Palamas says to Barlem God doesn't
Speaker 1: say I am existent being, I am the super essence.
Speaker 1: He says I am he. For example, when Saint Basil
Speaker 1: argues against Eunomius, and he specifically argues on the question
Speaker 1: of what the one is till on, he argues that
Speaker 1: it is a personal plane, it is about hypostasis. It
Speaker 1: is I am he. It is not I am essence,
Speaker 1: I am super being, I am whatever. It's I am he.
Speaker 1: So even I know that you want to say, I'm
Speaker 1: not starting with super essence, I'm starting with first reasoning
Speaker 1: back to first cause, and then predicating about analogically about
Speaker 1: what this essence is. What I'm saying to you is
Speaker 1: that we just reject that whole process, the hope, the
Speaker 1: whole hold on. So there could be two things here.
Speaker 2: So maybe you're saying that you just don't think that
Speaker 2: any proofs for Gaza distance work. Is that what you're planning.
Speaker 1: No, we believe in the transcendental argument as most compatible
Speaker 1: with orthodox theology. Saint John Damascus makes a transcendental argument.
Speaker 1: But yes, I do believe the classical arguments don't work
Speaker 1: very well. Precisely before this, well, we got precisely because
Speaker 1: of what, because of this issue that we're talking about.
Speaker 2: You mean they don't work because they get you in
Speaker 2: no place you don't want to be.
Speaker 1: No, I mean I argue with atheists all the time
Speaker 1: and refute them quite quite the frequently because of the
Speaker 1: transcendental argument. So it doesn't leave me to a place.
Speaker 2: No. I don't mean they like you don't want to
Speaker 2: I don't want there to be a guy. What I
Speaker 2: meant is you don't like the five ways, for example,
Speaker 2: because they would imply divine simplicity.
Speaker 1: Is that what you're saying, they are bad arguments based
Speaker 1: on classical foundationals epistemology and orthodox anthropology doesn't make sense
Speaker 1: with classical foundationalistemology.
Speaker 2: Okay, So I think I would like for this discussion
Speaker 2: to be fruitful. I think we should do maybe two things.
Speaker 2: Maybe this is a rabbit hole, so tell me if
Speaker 2: you don't want to do this. But so on the
Speaker 2: one hand, I think it would be good to probe
Speaker 2: this five ways issue a bit because I agree with
Speaker 2: you that if we if we think that those are bunk,
Speaker 2: then your arguments for divine simplicity are going to be
Speaker 2: take short of their foundation. But here's this other thing.
Speaker 1: So it's right.
Speaker 2: So let me grant you for a minute that they're
Speaker 2: a starting point as a Christian should be a revelation
Speaker 2: rather than natural reason, start from God speaking in the
Speaker 2: burning bush, rather than what we can know by the revelation,
Speaker 2: which is written in the world around us. Very Saint Paul, right,
Speaker 2: granting that, surely you would still want to maintain that
Speaker 2: whatever the God of revelation is, it's not caused, and
Speaker 2: it's the sort of thing whose explanation you don't have
Speaker 2: to seek.
Speaker 1: Right, sure, I mean Eastern fathers will will say at
Speaker 1: times God is first cause. Saint JOHNA. Mascus says that
Speaker 1: I'm sure.
Speaker 2: And so what I'm trying to do, and what I
Speaker 2: think divine simplicity does is it's a logical consequence of
Speaker 2: a coherent claim that God is the first cause. And
Speaker 2: so if you don't think that it follows from the
Speaker 2: claim that God is the first cause, I would be
Speaker 2: interested to see where where you think that argument comes apart.
Speaker 2: I can restate, why does the first cause have to
Speaker 2: be absolutely simple?
Speaker 1: Why can't there be compositive first cause? I mean, there's
Speaker 1: no In other words, I have to accept a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of other life philosophical.
Speaker 2: Of course, And I'm trying to figure out which of
Speaker 2: those premises you're attacking. So the premising question would be
Speaker 2: whenever you have two things that are right. So when
Speaker 2: I have an attribute, but let's just can we go
Speaker 2: with that as an example of composition.
Speaker 1: Okay, but I go ahead?
Speaker 2: Okay, Right, So when I have an attribute, right again,
Speaker 2: that's going to mean that the subject, according to the
Speaker 2: framework I'm using, the subject has been actualized by this
Speaker 2: distinct reality is inhering in it. And so it seems
Speaker 2: as though if you're going to grant that the composition
Speaker 2: of subject and accident can be analyzed into a relation
Speaker 2: to potency and act, and you want to maintain that
Speaker 2: God is not does not have potency, then you're going
Speaker 2: to have to grant a god you can accident. Now
Speaker 2: there are more prevacies there.
Speaker 1: So go ahead, but we don't maintain that again, you
Speaker 1: don't maintain which part we don't believe that God is
Speaker 1: pure act with no potential.
Speaker 2: Okay, So let's rewind then, So it seems as the
Speaker 2: when I look around at ordinary things, right, and I
Speaker 2: see that I'm staring at the coffee mug on my desk,
Speaker 2: I see that it is the certain shape, and I
Speaker 2: can ask why, right, And that's a good question to ask.
Speaker 2: It doesn't explain itself. It didn't have that shape and
Speaker 2: that color just because of the nature of the matter
Speaker 2: that makes it up.
Speaker 1: Right, So I need to.
Speaker 2: Seek outside of the cup for the reason why the
Speaker 2: cup is and why it is this way. And it's
Speaker 2: precisely because the cup didn't have.
Speaker 1: To be this way. Yeah, I mean, I understand.
Speaker 2: So in other words, whenever you have you have is
Speaker 2: which didn't have to be this way, and whenever you've
Speaker 2: got something which is this way but didn't have to
Speaker 2: be this way, you need to ask why.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: So I'm saying that if you say that God has potency,
Speaker 2: it's actualized, then you need to explain why that happened.
Speaker 1: Sure. Well, the person I would say is that if
Speaker 1: I adopt the tonistic doctrine of what simplicity is, and
Speaker 1: if identify God's actions with his essence, then it's very
Speaker 1: difficult to see. And I would say, you can't argue
Speaker 1: that creation is actually a free action of God. Now,
Speaker 1: all historic orthodoxyology hold on because create the act of
Speaker 1: creating the world. I know, I know this objection quite well.
Speaker 1: More to this objection, which I bet you don't know,
Speaker 1: which is that it's not just a matter of whether
Speaker 1: or not the action of creating was constrained by God's essence,
Speaker 1: because they're identified. There's also a question of the divine exemplars.
Speaker 1: This is because it's multiple times in the Suma identifies
Speaker 1: the exemplars, the ideas behind the created things with the essence. Now,
Speaker 1: if creation is based on the exemplars, then creation it's
Speaker 1: hard to see how it's not also just as unchanging
Speaker 1: and eternal as the exemplars upon which they're based. And
Speaker 1: this is why worthodoxynology. That's why Saint Maximus and Gregory,
Speaker 1: they don't identify the ideas or the logo with the
Speaker 1: essence of God. They are the things around the God,
Speaker 1: around God. This is why Dionysius the Areopagite, who Aquinas
Speaker 1: cites multiple times that makes the distinction between essence and energy.
Speaker 1: This is why Dionysius says that you can never get
Speaker 1: to God's essence, and you can't even via negativa reason
Speaker 1: about God's essence. It's not just a question of unifical
Speaker 1: or analogical. Analogical analogical Another questions which we should say
Speaker 1: for a little bit, but theological doesn't work either because
Speaker 1: of the doctrine of divind's implicity as stated by Quinus.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, so first thing, like, I would like to
Speaker 2: keep the ARGUMENTI I just gave separate from that.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So there's there's two things that both of us need
Speaker 2: to do in this debate, right. So one of them
Speaker 2: is make the case for why our position has to be,
Speaker 2: why we think it has to be the way it is,
Speaker 2: and the other one is to defend against objections to it.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So when I'm giving you the potency act argument, right,
Speaker 2: that's why I think it has to be the case.
Speaker 2: And then I need to defend against objections like and
Speaker 2: then how do you make sense of freedom?
Speaker 1: Right? So likewise, but.
Speaker 2: Energy essence, right, you're saying you need to One of
Speaker 2: the reasons why you believe in the energy is essence
Speaker 2: distinction is because you think it's necessary to say a
Speaker 2: guard divine freedom.
Speaker 1: And then you have.
Speaker 2: As an objection. Right, So let's let's just keep these
Speaker 2: two different things separate.
Speaker 1: I believe it because it's revealed, and I also believe
Speaker 1: my view of what God is in terms of simplicity
Speaker 1: because it's revealed. I don't begin by looking at the
Speaker 1: composition of created things like coffee cups and try to
Speaker 1: reason back and say, well, there must have been a
Speaker 1: first simple cause that's not like a composite coffee cup.
Speaker 1: In fact, I don't have to go that route. And
Speaker 1: when you look at the early Church Fathers, when you
Speaker 1: look at the way Scripture talks about these things, it's
Speaker 1: a revealed doctrine, both of the persons and of what
Speaker 1: God's nature is, which we don't know what it is,
Speaker 1: of course, So no, we don't begin. As Paul says
Speaker 1: in Act seventeen, the divine ussia is not like any
Speaker 1: created thing. What he's arguing with you.
Speaker 2: Don't need to argue with me about that. That's actually
Speaker 2: kind of both of our points. So anyway, keep going.
Speaker 1: But but a Thomas also wants his cake and to
Speaker 1: eat it too, because he also says that this absolutely
Speaker 1: simple divine essence does that there is an analogical similarity
Speaker 1: between what's in this essence, the divine exemplars and the
Speaker 1: created forms, and the creative forms are nothing like an
Speaker 1: absolutely simple essence. So there's a divide where there's not
Speaker 1: a bridge between this absolutely simple essence because there's no
Speaker 1: uncreated grace, there's no bridge between the absolutely simple uncreated
Speaker 1: and the created, and they share no similarity. Then there's
Speaker 1: no basis for the analogia analogia innthis or the participation
Speaker 1: in God in terms of redemption. It's all created grace,
Speaker 1: it's all it's all bridged off by by Thomas's doctrine
Speaker 1: of simplicity. Now I recognize again that he wants there
Speaker 1: to be distinctions of persons. He wants there to be
Speaker 1: God acting within time and space in terms of the
Speaker 1: incarnation the logos somehow entering into a mode of being
Speaker 1: that the Father and the Spirit do not. But our
Speaker 1: contention is that in the system as a whole, with
Speaker 1: all Thomas's claims and presuppositions, it doesn't work. It's contradictory.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, let's let's keep So we've got
Speaker 2: three issues on the table as of this moment. Right.
Speaker 2: So we've got, on the one hand, my question, which
Speaker 2: you haven't answered yet, which is, how is it why
Speaker 2: is it that a compositive potency in act wouldn't need
Speaker 2: an explanation? You have the second question, which is you've
Speaker 2: addressed to me which I haven't answered yet, which is
Speaker 2: how it would be possible for an absolutely simple God
Speaker 2: to be free. And then there's the third question, which
Speaker 2: isn't a pistological question, which is if we don't if
Speaker 2: we grant that the divine essence is transcendent, what what
Speaker 2: are our predicates lashing onto? Right? And that's the problem
Speaker 2: with analogy. And so those are I think three separate issues.
Speaker 2: We should probably go over.
Speaker 1: Them one by one. Okay, So the first one is
Speaker 1: I've already answered it, and I said, first of all,
Speaker 1: we don't accept that God is pure act with no potentiality.
Speaker 2: That's not an answer though, right, because the way you
Speaker 2: need to explain to me is why is it?
Speaker 1: So you're it is an answer because in Christian theology,
Speaker 1: God is not explained in that way. He's revealed a
Speaker 1: certain way. So what my answer to you is that
Speaker 1: we don't have an answer to to acquine us to
Speaker 1: Aristotle's dilemma of accidents and substance, because that's not how
Speaker 1: we look at and view God. We don't use that system.
Speaker 1: It wasn't used for the first thousand years. So I
Speaker 1: don't have to answer that question because it's not applicable
Speaker 1: to how we know who God is. We know who
Speaker 1: God is through revelation and through participating in that field life. Well,
Speaker 1: we're all on board with.
Speaker 2: Saying that revelation is true, right, but the question is right.
Speaker 2: So I would challenge you to find examples in the
Speaker 2: scripture of saying that God is in potency to attributes
Speaker 2: or stuff like that.
Speaker 1: You keep asking me, what where can I have as
Speaker 1: I do at least you keep asking me to use
Speaker 1: Arisitilian terminology and classifications and categories, and I just told
Speaker 1: you that we don't, and they're not in scripture, and
Speaker 1: they're not in the in the first thousand years of
Speaker 1: the church farm generally speaking.
Speaker 2: The thing that you had said first was that you're
Speaker 2: fine with saying that God has potency least.
Speaker 1: I was trying to speak to your terminology, for example,
Speaker 1: in Bradshaw's essays in his book, where he says that
Speaker 1: if we follow through what's saying that God has no potentiality,
Speaker 1: it's difficult to see how there's a free act of creation.
Speaker 1: But I'm moving the step back further and I'm saying
Speaker 1: we reject your doctrine of what simplicity is because it's
Speaker 1: direct from origin and.
Speaker 2: I'm not interested in arguments from authority or where claims
Speaker 2: came from.
Speaker 1: What I'm trying to for a thousand years, right matters.
Speaker 1: Of course, it matters where they came from. If you're
Speaker 1: if you're just rehashing Platinus, then that's a problem and
Speaker 1: a point does that? No?
Speaker 2: No, I mean, look what we're trying to do, or
Speaker 2: at least here's what I'm trying to do. Right, So
Speaker 2: we've got we've got a revelation. We know by revelation
Speaker 2: a couple of things. We know more than a couple.
Speaker 2: We know that there is one God, and that he
Speaker 2: is the first cause of all things, that he's three persons,
Speaker 2: and that the second person became man and died.
Speaker 1: For our sense, I mean.
Speaker 2: Matters if something is directly contained in revelation. But like
Speaker 2: what where like these distinctions came from. I'm not sure why.
Speaker 2: That's germane right, So to say that Platinus originated this
Speaker 2: way understanding what it means to be the first one cool.
Speaker 1: So, soology it does matter. It does matter because it's
Speaker 1: the doctrine of the Heretics and the doctrine of the
Speaker 1: Greeks that the early councils rejected. So every time the
Speaker 1: Christological controversies happen. They argue against guys who were influenced
Speaker 1: by Greek thought. This actually comes up in the writings
Speaker 1: of the Fathers and in the Councils. They say, you've
Speaker 1: been influenced by the Hellenic ideas of what simplicity is.
Speaker 1: So if Plotinus talks about simplicity in a certain way
Speaker 1: and in which it identifies all the names or attributes
Speaker 1: of the one with the essence of the one, and
Speaker 1: then when you know Meius says the exact same thing.
Speaker 1: In Saint Gregor Nissa writes an a hit or page
Speaker 1: book against Eunomius and makes this very argument, saying, Hey, Youunomius,
Speaker 1: you got your argument from Plotinus. I would say that
Speaker 1: I can just simply repeat that same argument against you,
Speaker 1: because a Quitas rehashes the same argument from Eunomius and
Speaker 1: from Plotinus. So absolutely tell.
Speaker 2: Me, though, is that somebody who, by dint of using
Speaker 2: reason alone, with no help from revelation says some true
Speaker 2: things and some false things. No, that's not You who
Speaker 2: have the revelation should discard the baby with the bathwater.
Speaker 2: That's what I'm hearing. Like what I say, know, most.
Speaker 1: Of these, most of these were fine with heedagogy. So
Speaker 1: you're making a strong man. I didn't say that we
Speaker 1: have to throw out all philosophy or anything a question.
Speaker 2: If it's the case, the fact that Platinus said something
Speaker 2: means that it's wrong.
Speaker 1: That's the origin of this proposition. Okay, do you do
Speaker 1: you understand big bid? Do you understand dialectics? Right? So,
Speaker 1: when the early church fathers are arguing against somebody like Celsus,
Speaker 1: or whether they're arguing against Arius, or whether they're arguing
Speaker 1: against Eunomius, they often talked about how these heretics employed dialectics.
Speaker 1: And so, for example, it's Platonis who pioneered this, right,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter whether it's Platinus who said it or
Speaker 1: whether it's Nestorius who said it. The same heresy is
Speaker 1: being restated. Who cares who said it if it's wrong
Speaker 1: in principle, So I'll grant you that, yes, it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter ultimately who said it. But I'm saying that when
Speaker 1: the Church fathers argue against these things, they absolutely are
Speaker 1: concerned with the origin or the wellspring of where these
Speaker 1: errors come from. And I'm telling you that we reject
Speaker 1: the Greek philosophical origin of how we understand what simplicity
Speaker 1: is and we actually just go to what's revealed. That's
Speaker 1: what the Church fathers do. That that's why they reject
Speaker 1: Hellenic dialectics every time there's a council, and particularly the
Speaker 1: sixth count.
Speaker 2: My only point is, I'm not going to accept it
Speaker 2: as a valid accounter argument that you say that this
Speaker 2: principle or whatever was articulated by Platinus, and Platinus tell
Speaker 2: some heretical views, therefore they must not hold this principle.
Speaker 1: That's the argument. The argument is, your doctor of simplicity
Speaker 1: is the same as Platinass, and it's heretical man.
Speaker 2: And it's certainly not the same as Platonis is because
Speaker 2: I hold the trinity right, the emination.
Speaker 1: Of new from the already I already had one when
Speaker 1: I said that, the question wasn't whether Thomas also said
Speaker 1: correct things elsewhere, but whether the doctrine simplicity itself wasn't
Speaker 1: the exact same as what Platina said. And when Platina
Speaker 1: says that all the acts and names and operations of
Speaker 1: God or the One are exactly the same as the essence,
Speaker 1: that's the same as what Aquina says. And so when
Speaker 1: This is why Origin was led to say that the
Speaker 1: son is a different subsistence or a different kind of
Speaker 1: created subsistence, different from the Father, because he identified the
Speaker 1: hypostasis of the father with the essence. This is why
Speaker 1: you Nomius identified the father with unoriginate and with absolutely
Speaker 1: simple essence.
Speaker 2: In other words, you're saying that you think that the
Speaker 2: platinum doctrine Platita thinks that the one is completely simple. Okay, fine,
Speaker 2: and that this one means can only be one hypostasis
Speaker 2: in itself. It can't be three that have the nature
Speaker 2: of the one. If you could even speak of the
Speaker 2: nature of the one, that you probably can't. For him,
Speaker 2: and Thomas wants to hold that that same doctrine of
Speaker 2: divine simplicity, you say, but with but also persons, correct?
Speaker 1: Is that right? Yes, it's the same philosophical Greek idea
Speaker 1: of what simplicity is, and then also the idea of
Speaker 1: let's also tack on persons. Let's use the Greeks and
Speaker 1: so far as they were good at talking about simplicity
Speaker 1: and the monad, and let's tack on three hypostasies. And
Speaker 1: the argument is that given what's said in Greek and
Speaker 1: Hellenic thought generally that I'm talking about here about what
Speaker 1: simplicity is. It doesn't there's no place for real distinctions
Speaker 1: in the persons. This is why it leads to modalism.
Speaker 1: This is why.
Speaker 2: Do you want to get to Aquinas's trinitarian theory then,
Speaker 2: because that would be our next step. I'm still going
Speaker 2: to say, I'm like, I would like to go back
Speaker 2: to the problem of whether or not you're willing to
Speaker 2: say that God has potency, So I'm going to take
Speaker 2: that as just bracketed for the moment. Do you want
Speaker 2: to go to trinity instead?
Speaker 1: I mean, if you listen to what I say, right,
Speaker 1: So when I said yes, if you want to use
Speaker 1: your language and say does God have potency, then I
Speaker 1: would say in the sense of him not having to create,
Speaker 1: but yet he chose to create. That is.
Speaker 2: So, well, this is just a verbal that part is
Speaker 2: just a verbal distinction, right. So Aquinas constantly uses this
Speaker 2: distinction between active and passive potency, and the only kind
Speaker 2: of which he's going to deny of God as passive potency,
Speaker 2: which is the kind of has.
Speaker 1: Let's just we can cut past all this and just
Speaker 1: make it very clear that that Aquinas says that all
Speaker 1: the distinctions and the attributes of God are notional. They're
Speaker 1: not real that they're just conceptual distinctions that we make.
Speaker 1: And so God's love is the exact same as the
Speaker 1: essence is the exact same as the Foregnoledge is exact
Speaker 1: same as the act of creating. That's ultimately foolish. I
Speaker 1: agree with the first part of the claim.
Speaker 2: Right, So he does say that God's essence is the
Speaker 2: same as his active loving himself, which is the same
Speaker 2: as his active knowing himself. It is the same as
Speaker 2: his active existence, which is the same as the act
Speaker 2: by which He makes all things that it's.
Speaker 1: Also the attributes that are the same as the essence
Speaker 1: of God.
Speaker 2: Sure, so then you were talking about we're trying we're
Speaker 2: talking about acting passive power. Right, So obviously right, God
Speaker 2: can make things that he hasn't made. But for a
Speaker 2: quintas that doesn't imply that God is. What we need
Speaker 2: to avoid is saying that God is receiving something or
Speaker 2: being actualized by something which he did not have to
Speaker 2: receive or be actualized by. Right, Does that Does that
Speaker 2: make sense? Raison, What we're trying to do is exclude
Speaker 2: receptivity or passivity from the divine nature?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: Is that a goal that you're okay with? Or do
Speaker 2: I need to defend that one?
Speaker 1: I don't think that that any Orthodox person would say
Speaker 1: that God's that God needed anything in his nature or
Speaker 1: anything like that.
Speaker 2: That that that's when I say that God doesn't have potency.
Speaker 2: That's just what I mean. Right, So the cup is
Speaker 2: in potency to this shape or that shape by virtue,
Speaker 2: but it's matter, and so it's being actualized by that,
Speaker 2: and so the cups needed some sort of shape.
Speaker 1: That's what we.
Speaker 2: Deny when we deny that God has potency and Aristotelian terms,
Speaker 2: if you want, if you if you like the word
Speaker 2: need better or open slot or whatever, that's fine, same idea. Okay,
Speaker 2: So are we okay? Can we then agree that God
Speaker 2: doesn't have.
Speaker 1: Potent as far as I can tell, yes, that makes sense. Okay.
Speaker 2: So that's all that we're trying to maintain when we
Speaker 2: hold that God is entirely simple. We don't want anything
Speaker 2: in God which would fill a slot.
Speaker 1: That's really that's not all.
Speaker 2: That that's our reason for holding it. Okay. So if
Speaker 2: you can show what you need to do, and this
Speaker 2: is what I tried to do, in my own DISSERTATIONE. Right,
Speaker 2: So I'm arguing with you, but I'm actually at least
Speaker 2: half on your side. So we get to that part
Speaker 2: in a minute. But what you would need to do
Speaker 2: is to explain why the kind of multiplicity that you
Speaker 2: want doesn't involve actualizing or filling a need or an
Speaker 2: open slot or whatever in the divinity.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would, just because that makes sense, I would
Speaker 1: throw out of all these categories, big part I would
Speaker 1: throw out.
Speaker 2: Well, surely though, you're going to agree now, No, you can.
Speaker 2: What you can what you can do is you can
Speaker 2: tell me that these things right, So give me an
Speaker 2: example of multiplicity, say the divine persons. You can say us, well, agree,
Speaker 2: of course, but this multiplicity does not involve an actualization
Speaker 2: of the divine essence, and so we can allow it.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: But what you need to do is for every case
Speaker 2: of an energy that you describe, you need to explain
Speaker 2: to the temist why this doesn't count as right, Why this,
Speaker 2: why you don't need these categories right, why they don't apply.
Speaker 2: I think the onness is on you.
Speaker 1: No, it's not, because, first of all, there is a
Speaker 1: thousand years of the Church using categories and explanations in
Speaker 1: terms that are not Tomistic and are not Aristotelian. So
Speaker 1: we already have like the use of this. So it's
Speaker 1: the onus is not on me, but actually on in this.
Speaker 1: Of course, you know, it was very controversial when when
Speaker 1: Tomism began to adopt the restilianism. Uh so, And ultimately, yes,
Speaker 1: it's not you know so much about this or that
Speaker 1: specific term, but it's about the the almost scientistic approach
Speaker 1: to dissecting God in this way and not looking at
Speaker 1: how the revelation of what hoopostasis is in the New
Speaker 1: Testament or what innergaia is as opposed to fusis in
Speaker 1: the New Testament.
Speaker 2: Right, I don't know what you mean by scientistic right,
Speaker 2: what we've gotten as the data of revelation, right, we've.
Speaker 1: Got it's not data. It's it's not natural revelation as
Speaker 1: a science. Theology is not the queen of science. That's
Speaker 1: what I mean by scientistic. Right. It's about it's about understanding,
Speaker 1: yes it is, but that means that understanding comes through
Speaker 1: the direct experience of God, not through the intellect.
Speaker 2: Well, okay, so if you want to say that the
Speaker 2: only proper knowledge of God is by mystical vision and
Speaker 2: then we're just wasting our time talking about him.
Speaker 1: Right, that's probably true. I believe in an analogia that's
Speaker 1: applicable to the energies. Right, so the logoi to read,
Speaker 1: say Maximus, the doctrine of the logoi, which he identifies
Speaker 1: as divine ideas. Uh, they're uncreated energies, they're not the
Speaker 1: essence of God. And so again what you notice is
Speaker 1: that what distinguishes the Orthodox position consistently across the board.
Speaker 1: That's why I started out talking about how we have
Speaker 1: a different anthropology, we have a different triology, we have
Speaker 1: a different doctrine of Christology, and a different eschatology and
Speaker 1: a different ecclesiology. Is cause of the U S and
Speaker 1: S energy distinction and all these different points. So it's
Speaker 1: a whole system. It's it's holistic in our U.
Speaker 2: I understand that. But so let me just try to
Speaker 2: plug it in. Since your we're back to energy, let's
Speaker 2: just try to plug in that term energy into the
Speaker 2: question I was asking you. All Right, so what if
Speaker 2: Thomas is going to be worried about when he hears
Speaker 2: you're talking about divine energies. Is the question of whether
Speaker 2: these energies would be such as to actualize the divinessence.
Speaker 2: I assume correct me if I'm wrong. I think you
Speaker 2: would want to say that, in fact, they don't actualize
Speaker 2: the divine essence, and that they're not received by or
Speaker 2: that they're not principles of God's existence or God's nature
Speaker 2: at all. What I'm trying to tell you that you
Speaker 2: have anything God? Is that fair statement?
Speaker 1: Yeah? But what I've been trying to convey is that
Speaker 1: you have to reject homism. Right, this whole system is
Speaker 1: a problem. So because you are trying to force me
Speaker 1: into the risk of to you categor worries, I'm trying to.
Speaker 2: Tell you an It's just this is not like Aristotle.
Speaker 2: Say that and not right, and that's something is necessary
Speaker 2: or contingent. This is not Aristotle.
Speaker 1: This is just about you were talking about in potentia
Speaker 1: and actuality and active through.
Speaker 2: It just means can be. It's what can be. That's
Speaker 2: all it is. I know that's not Aristotle's copyright.
Speaker 1: I know what contingency means. What I'm telling you is
Speaker 1: that you are a Tomas and these categories that you're
Speaker 1: talking about did come from Aristotle, and they were introduced
Speaker 1: by Uh. You know Thomas and his his teacher Albert Magnus,
Speaker 1: they were not the norm for the first thousand years
Speaker 1: of the church. Now why weren't they the norm? Precisely
Speaker 1: because of the questions.
Speaker 2: And we're not trying to have an argument about terms here,
Speaker 2: You're you're saying the.
Speaker 1: Part we are because because we reject your doctrine of simplicity. Doctrine,
Speaker 1: don't can you not see that, Helen doc simplicity can
Speaker 1: be questioned.
Speaker 2: Of course you can be questioned, but I'm saying that
Speaker 2: this doctrine of simplicity arrest like you can be questioned,
Speaker 2: I don't think that it can be successfully debunked. But okay,
Speaker 2: well reason.
Speaker 1: So there's a whole there's a whole, eight hundred page
Speaker 1: book that debunks it, written by Saint Grego. There are
Speaker 1: lots of books that try to that's another the Doctor
Speaker 1: of the Church and he and he shows that Eunomianism
Speaker 1: is modalism based on it's his doctrine simplicity. It's the
Speaker 1: exact same doctor simplicity.
Speaker 2: Hold on, we're not here to just trade claims. You're
Speaker 2: wrong or you're wrong, right. We're here to try to
Speaker 2: evaluate arguments as best as we can, right, And so
Speaker 2: the argument that.
Speaker 1: That Aquinas's doctrine simplicity is exact same as eunomius doctrine simplicity,
Speaker 1: and although the conclusions are different, Eunomius is refuted in
Speaker 1: eight hundred pages by Saint Gregoranissa and the whole argument
Speaker 1: is based on essence, energy distinction, as well as other things.
Speaker 2: Okay, so let me latch onto that. Then how are
Speaker 2: you defining the divine simplicity doctrine, which you say Aquinas
Speaker 2: shares with Eunomias.
Speaker 1: Well, I can look at the suma under the questions
Speaker 1: like question three the simplicity of God, where it's stated
Speaker 1: very clearly in those what eight questions? I think he says,
Speaker 1: is God composite? Is the simple? Is God's existence exact
Speaker 1: same as his essence? Yes? It is? Is there any
Speaker 1: accidents in God? No? Are the attributes the same as
Speaker 1: the essence of God?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 1: Are they just logical distinctions? Yes? So forth and so on.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's not a whole lot of debate. I
Speaker 1: wouldn't think about what Thomas says divine.
Speaker 2: And so you're holding the Eunomius holds likewise that God
Speaker 2: is identical to anything that can be said of him,
Speaker 2: and therefore there can't be a trinity.
Speaker 1: The only difference, the only difference between Aquinas and Eunomius
Speaker 1: is that Aquinas wants there to be a via negativa
Speaker 1: and Eunomius didn't. Ah, you can you can fall on
Speaker 1: two sides of this coin. You can fall on the
Speaker 1: on the side of the coin with the quietness where
Speaker 1: you want both things to.
Speaker 2: Be true, or you can follow on both things are white,
Speaker 2: the trinity of persons and unity of nature? That what
Speaker 2: well were the three of the two things are a
Speaker 2: trinity of persons and simplicity of nature?
Speaker 1: What two things?
Speaker 2: That's the whole both things at once? What two things?
Speaker 2: Simplicity of nature, persons.
Speaker 1: And the via negativa where we can predicate analogically of God.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure that the via negativa issue is what's
Speaker 2: at stake here.
Speaker 1: So let me this is why. It's the exact same
Speaker 1: debate that Saint Gregory had with Barleum. Barleam says that
Speaker 1: when we predicate of God, we predicate of him substantially
Speaker 1: but analogically, and Saint Gregory responds by saying, if God
Speaker 1: is an absolutely simple essence, and you only know creative effects.
Speaker 1: You don't actually know God. You don't actually know God
Speaker 1: because you never know whether you're experiencing what attribute, because
Speaker 1: all the attributes are divine essence A right, I mean,
Speaker 1: you're experiencing love. How do you know you're experiencing love
Speaker 1: or justice or pere knowledge or what? You never know
Speaker 1: because they're all the same as a divine essence. And
Speaker 1: you don't ever participate in God.
Speaker 2: And I'm happy to get into a problem of analogical predication,
Speaker 2: but I'm not sure that's the same problem. Can we
Speaker 2: see trinity for just a sec Okay, so let me
Speaker 2: just try it. Maybe this will or maybe this won't
Speaker 2: be germane to the to your point, but let me
Speaker 2: try to give Aquitance's defense. Right, So this is now
Speaker 2: the other side of the coins, not arguing force position.
Speaker 2: It's repelling objections, explaining why he thinks that his doctrine
Speaker 2: of simplicity is compatible with the trinity of persons, right,
Speaker 2: because it seems to me that you're just saying that
Speaker 2: straight up. It's just a case of trying to have
Speaker 2: your cake and eat it too, right, right, correct? Yeah,
Speaker 2: so Aquitances claim he holds divine simplicity to this extent.
Speaker 2: He doesn't want there to be anything in God which
Speaker 2: actualizes or is a principle of God's existence. Now, the
Speaker 2: reason why he thinks this is compatible with there being
Speaker 2: three subsistent relations in the divinity is because of how
Speaker 2: he understands the nature of relation in particular. Right, so
Speaker 2: he does more arsitilian framework.
Speaker 1: Bear with me.
Speaker 2: So in his framework, every anything, all ten of the
Speaker 2: categories are going to have two sides to them. Right,
Speaker 2: There's going to be the essay side, and there's going
Speaker 2: to be the form of the Razio side.
Speaker 1: Right, So you have.
Speaker 2: Dog nature and a substantial form, and you have the
Speaker 2: essay which is proper to it, which is subsistent essay.
Speaker 1: And then you have.
Speaker 2: Quantity his form. And then there's the essay which is
Speaker 2: proper to which is n s or inherence, and the
Speaker 2: same for quality. And in the case of these two,
Speaker 2: there's a double sort of inherence. According to Aquinas, So
Speaker 2: quantity and here's.
Speaker 1: This cup is big.
Speaker 2: Let's say quantity and here's a subject, both in the
Speaker 2: sense that it draws its existence from that subject.
Speaker 1: Right, it doesn't.
Speaker 2: Quantity doesn't just hang out on its own, and it's
Speaker 2: always the quantity of something. And here's in that sense,
Speaker 2: and here is in a further sense, which is that
Speaker 2: it posits that content, that formal content in the subject
Speaker 2: and makes that cup b three ounces whatever. Right, So
Speaker 2: it serves now as a principle of that cup's being,
Speaker 2: makes that could be in a certain way. Okay, And
Speaker 2: same for quality. So all the things that we normally
Speaker 2: think of as attributes, whereas accidents have this double inherence
Speaker 2: that they exists in the subject, draw their existence from it,
Speaker 2: and they make it be in a certain way. So
Speaker 2: Aquitans is going to deny that there can be any
Speaker 2: anything predicated of God, anything really distinct from God in
Speaker 2: hearing in him, after the fashion of quantity or quality.
Speaker 2: And the reason is because quantity or equality and here
Speaker 2: is in that second way. And thus would if really
Speaker 2: distinct from God, add something to God's being? Relation is
Speaker 2: different according to Aquinas, because it doesn't do that. And
Speaker 2: here's only in the first way.
Speaker 1: Still got an.
Speaker 2: Essay one creatures, but it doesn't make its subject. It
Speaker 2: doesn't it doesn't add any new content to the subject.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So, and you've got these two cups that are equal
Speaker 2: in size to each other the size right, that's in
Speaker 2: the category of quantity, posits content in the subject, actualizes
Speaker 2: it and modifies it. And based on the fact that
Speaker 2: it's got this thing which is modifying it, it's got
Speaker 2: this other feature, which is the relation of equality, which
Speaker 2: doesn't add anything to the cup at all, doesn't make it,
Speaker 2: doesn't modify, it doesn't actualize, it doesn't limit it nothing.
Speaker 2: So it's it's Rozzio guerna Quinas is pure towardness, purely
Speaker 2: towards something else. So that's just among creatures. Transposing this
Speaker 2: to God, he's going to say, okay, So, like everything
Speaker 2: else in God, our arguments for divine simplicity are right.
Speaker 2: The essay sign of this accident is not going to
Speaker 2: be in essay. It's not going to be inherence. It's
Speaker 2: just going to be the solf same divine essay. But
Speaker 2: I can still talk about it's Rozzio, it's content being
Speaker 2: distinct from from other relations in God, because these relations, right,
Speaker 2: they're towards this is not towards the essence. They're not
Speaker 2: positive something in the essence, they're not modifying, and they're
Speaker 2: strictly looking outward. And so I can say that God,
Speaker 2: when kind nature is two because of the Father or
Speaker 2: from in the case of the Son, without actualizing, modifying, limiting,
Speaker 2: or what have you, of the divine nature. And so
Speaker 2: for aquittness, it's entirely principled to hold divine simplicity in
Speaker 2: the sense which I just stated, namely, there can be
Speaker 2: nothing in God which limits him or actualizes him, and
Speaker 2: at the same time to hold three subsistent relations in
Speaker 2: that divine nature. And so it's not ad hoc. It's
Speaker 2: not just we're going to tack it on. It has
Speaker 2: to do with what it means to talk about relations
Speaker 2: in the first place.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm familiar with what he says, and the problem
Speaker 1: is that it doesn't work. So, for one, the basic
Speaker 1: way to repute this is just to talk about the
Speaker 1: fact that this distinction is spoken of as relations of opposition.
Speaker 1: And yes, Aquinas does at times try to say that
Speaker 1: the Father is still the arcade of the Trinity, But
Speaker 1: what he doesn't understand is that for the Eastern position,
Speaker 1: which has already declined this dogmat Yeah, can you hear me?
Speaker 2: Hang on, I think I want to just say that again.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what I was trying to say is that this
Speaker 1: is already defined an Orthodox theology, we already had a
Speaker 1: way to understand the relations within the Trinity, precisely because
Speaker 1: we didn't have the absolute divine simplicity doctrine. So we
Speaker 1: already had an Eastern tradition that dealt with these issues,
Speaker 1: particularly in Saint Maximus Confessor, Saint Photius and so forth,
Speaker 1: who really fleshed this out on multiple levels. And that's
Speaker 1: because we don't have the absolute divind simplicity problem that
Speaker 1: we needed to even use relations of opposition. This does
Speaker 1: not come into play until Augustine and then later on
Speaker 1: picked up by Anselm an Aquinas. So the problems with
Speaker 1: this idea and the way that you formulated it is
Speaker 1: that I understand that Aquinas doesn't want it to be
Speaker 1: just tacked on. He wants it to really be, you know,
Speaker 1: three hypostases. But the problem is that when you get
Speaker 1: to this question of identifying the persons with the essence,
Speaker 1: which Aquinas is very dogmatic about, he says specifically that
Speaker 1: na curious person. This goes contrary to the fact that
Speaker 1: Saint John Damascus in on the Orthodox Faith, says very
Speaker 1: clearly that the identification of nature in person is the
Speaker 1: root of all heresies and that's because sat John Damascus
Speaker 1: understood that all the dialectical heretics would use this as
Speaker 1: this kind of dialectical relationship between thing and other one.
Speaker 1: In many simplicity and differentiation, they always set up a
Speaker 1: dialectical tension, and so relations of opposition are ironically or
Speaker 1: the Augustinian shield is a way to define the person's dialectically.
Speaker 1: The problem is that it doesn't work. For one, the
Speaker 1: spirit is subordinating in this relationship because he doesn't have
Speaker 1: a property that the other you have. And in fact,
Speaker 1: in Roman Catholic dogma it's actually stated more than once
Speaker 1: that the father and the son are together a co
Speaker 1: cause of the spirit. So the father and the son
Speaker 1: is sharing property that the spirit doesn't have. All of
Speaker 1: this in order to maintain this system of how to
Speaker 1: differentiate between persons and an absolutely simple essence again, just
Speaker 1: toss out the absolutely simple essence doctrine of a quitas
Speaker 1: except the Eastern doctrine, and you don't have this problem.
Speaker 1: The persons are differentiated because the father is the archae
Speaker 1: You unriginate the cause of the persons. The aspiration is
Speaker 1: unique to the spirit, generation is unique to the son,
Speaker 1: and you don't need this relation of oppositions doctrine, which
Speaker 1: is a dialectical philosophical speculation approach and actually doesn't really
Speaker 1: distinguish a person because in fact, every one of the
Speaker 1: persons shares this relation of being not the other. Right,
Speaker 1: each of the persons is not the son, is not
Speaker 1: the spirit is not the spirit is not the father,
Speaker 1: et cetera. So not being the other two, uh, and
Speaker 1: the spirit not having a property of producing a person
Speaker 1: imbalances the trinity. So the spirit ends up being subordinated.
Speaker 1: And this is the chief reason why the East has
Speaker 1: a problem with the Philly. Okay, So what you're talking
Speaker 1: about in a way to distinguish the persons that doesn't
Speaker 1: do damage to divine simplicity. Not only does it not work,
Speaker 1: it's actually the root of the Philly. Okay. The Philioka
Speaker 1: was introduced precisely because of this question and these issues,
Speaker 1: and it just simply doesn't work, all right.
Speaker 2: So first off, so I'm just going to reiterate my
Speaker 2: point about it appeals to authority.
Speaker 1: So you're you're in a Roman Catholic church, no, I know,
Speaker 1: appeals to authority and name Catholic.
Speaker 2: I would have appreciated if you like. Later emailed me
Speaker 2: the quotation you're thinking of, which one, the one about
Speaker 2: the root of all heresies? That sounds fun. It's an
Speaker 2: on the Orthodox faith. It's famous where you're talking about
Speaker 2: Crystal the Yeah. But secondly, apart from all that, So
Speaker 2: first off, so you want to go down the subordination
Speaker 2: to something, it's not clear.
Speaker 1: To me a what you gain by or how.
Speaker 2: This problem is more your problem for me than it
Speaker 2: is for anybody, including for yourself, because if you're going
Speaker 2: to say that subordinationism just means that one person is
Speaker 2: going to be subordinate to another in as much as
Speaker 2: it is from another, then.
Speaker 1: Feeling, then you've got a problem. So I said, the
Speaker 1: Roman doctrine of the father and the son together sharing
Speaker 1: the property of being the co calls of the spirit
Speaker 1: subordinates the spirit because the father and the shunt sons
Speaker 1: share a property that the Spirit does not. So in
Speaker 1: class if you read John Damascus or any Eastern Fathers
Speaker 1: or what's normative, even in some Catholic theology, they will
Speaker 1: make the claim that whatever we say something about God
Speaker 1: to Trinity, it's either applicable to the persons or to
Speaker 1: the essence. Right, So we're making a statement, either about
Speaker 1: the unity of God or about the persons. There's no
Speaker 1: there's no property that two persons share that the others
Speaker 1: that another person doesn't have. And infhilioquism is it's defined
Speaker 1: in Florence and the Roman dogmas. You have the father
Speaker 1: and the son as the co cause of the hypostasis
Speaker 1: of the spirit. It's not just the eternal manifestation, which
Speaker 1: is what we believe about the son sharing in the
Speaker 1: eternal manifestation of the spirit, the spirit rests in him.
Speaker 1: But in fact, in the Roman Catholic dogma, there's I
Speaker 1: don't think there's any question that it's the father and
Speaker 1: the son who are the hypostatic cause of the spirit.
Speaker 1: So the subordination comes by the fact that the father
Speaker 1: and the son share a property that the spirit does not.
Speaker 2: Okay, So it's true that Aquitus will say this too much,
Speaker 2: that there's four relations in God. There's going to be
Speaker 2: the relation of paternity, affiliation, of spiration, and of procession.
Speaker 2: And he holds up of those four and maybe this
Speaker 2: is the esthetic. Uh, it's a pleasure that you're having
Speaker 2: with us. Only three of those are I forget what
Speaker 2: the technical term is, but only three of those correspond
Speaker 2: to a person. The reason is because the fourth, namely spiration,
Speaker 2: is not held in opposition.
Speaker 1: It's not.
Speaker 2: Well, it's held in common by two persons, and so
Speaker 2: it doesn't serve to identify one person as as opposed
Speaker 2: to another.
Speaker 1: Well, he uses relations of opposition and he tries to
Speaker 1: use affiliation, spiration, et cetera. So so there's there's both
Speaker 1: our president of Quinas and it's only in the more
Speaker 1: radical philioquiz that really that relations of opposition even entered
Speaker 1: as a way to do it, but it doesn't work.
Speaker 1: But there is a section where he talks about relations
Speaker 1: of opposition.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, no, no, the relations of opposition essentral. So quin
Speaker 2: it's the theory, right. My point was just sure you
Speaker 2: have this aesthetic ugliness if you like that. Of the
Speaker 2: four relations with the two pairs, right, So, fraternity, affiliation,
Speaker 2: and procession to spiration, only three of those pick out
Speaker 2: a person. And the reason is because the fourth spiration
Speaker 2: is shared in common by two of itself. I'm not
Speaker 2: sure why that's why that's a problem.
Speaker 1: If you want to does the father and the son
Speaker 1: share a property that the spirit does not? In anything
Speaker 1: that you say about God is applicable either to the
Speaker 1: persons or to the nature.
Speaker 2: Okay, So by your theory, don't the son and the
Speaker 2: spirit both share a property which the Father does not.
Speaker 1: No being from, No, because because the way that they're
Speaker 1: defined is not merely being from the way they're defined
Speaker 1: is hypostatic origin. Generation defines the son, spiration defines the spirit,
Speaker 1: and the Father is the sole cause.
Speaker 2: Okay, and so okay, But so it seems so you see,
Speaker 2: I'm trying to forguret where to start here. So it
Speaker 2: seems as though I could say in reply, right, so
Speaker 2: what you've got there is they've got they both share
Speaker 2: this property of being from, and one of them is
Speaker 2: from in this way, which is being generated sonship, and
Speaker 2: one of them is being from in this way, which
Speaker 2: is being spiratd or proceeding or whatever. But it seems
Speaker 2: as though I can say the exact same thing with
Speaker 2: regards to spiration, right, because I can say that the
Speaker 2: son aspirates the spirit as from the Father, and I
Speaker 2: can say that the Father inspireates the spirit, not as from.
Speaker 2: And so although sure there's a verbal similarity at the
Speaker 2: level of abstraction, the reality is there's no like actual,
Speaker 2: real relation which father and son both have, which the
Speaker 2: spirit doesn't.
Speaker 1: But in the Roman dogma they're defined as a co cause.
Speaker 1: Father and son are.
Speaker 2: Hypostatically no person is caused by any other.
Speaker 1: Of course, they are cause.
Speaker 2: The cause means to receive it being. I don't think
Speaker 2: you want to say that.
Speaker 1: This is typical Orthodox and Church father terminology. The father
Speaker 1: is the sole cause. Even a quantus uses this terminology.
Speaker 2: So again, it just depends on what you mean by cause.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: It's if by cause you mean something which makes something else,
Speaker 2: obviously not normally when.
Speaker 1: It's in your own dogmas that the father and the
Speaker 1: son are the co cause of the spirits hypostasis.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if you want to send me footnotes, you want
Speaker 2: me to read the dogma to you the footnote. But
Speaker 2: when I'm trying to do right now is just the
Speaker 2: sentiquent position as I understand it, And to my knowledge,
Speaker 2: he's never going to say that the father causes the son.
Speaker 2: He's going to say that the father generates the son,
Speaker 2: is going to say that the son has the divine
Speaker 2: nature as from the father. He's a very precise, and
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 1: The term cause is used. They don't mean it in
Speaker 1: the sense of creating. It's just a it's just termin it's.
Speaker 2: Used as synonymous for XS from WY. That's fine.
Speaker 1: Well, that's how it's used patristically, so they're not saying
Speaker 1: and many church fathers use this terminology. Again, it's in Florence. Uh,
Speaker 1: the father and the son are a co cause I'm
Speaker 1: looking for the other. I think it's lateran it talks
Speaker 1: about I'll give you the Denzinger here in a second.
Speaker 1: But but again, the point is that that in the
Speaker 1: you have a balanced position in the East where you
Speaker 1: don't have attributes of properties that that two have. And
Speaker 1: saying from from a source is not an attribute because
Speaker 1: it's it's not a positive relation. It's a negative relation.
Speaker 1: That doesn't that doesn't express anything that's part of that
Speaker 1: relation of opposition. We don't we don't do relations of opposition.
Speaker 1: We do hypostatic origin as the way to understand the trinity.
Speaker 1: And since the Father alone is the sole cause or
Speaker 1: arcade of the trinity, he's the unoriginate one. The only
Speaker 1: way to distinguish the person's is by hypostatic origins, by
Speaker 1: the fact that the son is generated and the spirit
Speaker 1: eternally proceeds.
Speaker 2: So how do you distinguish what it means to be
Speaker 2: generated and what it means to be proceeded.
Speaker 1: I will tell you what every single Eastern father says
Speaker 1: to that very question, which is that we don't know
Speaker 1: what those words mean.
Speaker 2: Okay, But what Acquinance is trying to do is to
Speaker 2: give a principled reason for why these two should not
Speaker 2: collapse into each other. Right, And it seems as if
Speaker 2: that's something valuable today. Just to go back to the
Speaker 2: subordination as something again, it's just not clear to me.
Speaker 2: It's not clear to me why by saying that the
Speaker 2: father is strictly two, by saying that the son is
Speaker 2: both from end to and saying that the spirit is
Speaker 2: strictly from It's not clear to me why I am
Speaker 2: saying that one of these is like better or nobler
Speaker 2: or higher than the other. Right, Because and Iquanas does
Speaker 2: discuss this objection, and his point is simply that when
Speaker 2: you're talking about nobility, if the nobility comes strictly from
Speaker 2: the difine essence, that's something absolute and that's shared equally
Speaker 2: by all. To speak of from and to or from
Speaker 2: end too, is not to speak in the language of
Speaker 2: better or worse, more primary or secondary.
Speaker 1: The idea of subordination doesn't have to do necessarily. We're
Speaker 1: just defining what is less and more noble. What do
Speaker 1: you mean by subordin? What is it that you see
Speaker 1: as the problem with what you're calling subordination? And what
Speaker 1: and how do you define it? That again, in our tridology,
Speaker 1: which I again would argue is from the Eastern fathers
Speaker 1: and councils and not just like my speculation, our triology
Speaker 1: doesn't argue that that we can say anything about God
Speaker 1: that isn't applicable to hypostasis or to God considered as
Speaker 1: unity right to one God. So if we say wisdom,
Speaker 1: wisdom is a property or attribute that is applicable to
Speaker 1: all the persons. Right, So it's not like the Father
Speaker 1: alone has wisdom and the spirit doesn't. Right, So that's
Speaker 1: a that's a statement about God considered as God. It's
Speaker 1: applicable to all the persons because because wisdom is a
Speaker 1: wisdom is a natural attribute. It's a property or an
Speaker 1: attribute applicable to nature. So likewise, when we say that
Speaker 1: we consider the will of God, does God have three
Speaker 1: wills or one will? God has one will? Because will
Speaker 1: is a property of nature and not a property of hypostasis,
Speaker 1: and for us, this is applicable to anything that's said
Speaker 1: about God. So when we even when we talk about
Speaker 1: trinitarian relations, when we talk about how we distinguish the persons,
Speaker 1: we distinguish them by their origin, by the fact that
Speaker 1: the Father alone is the fact that you have a
Speaker 1: problem with the Father soul ark or cause, I think
Speaker 1: shows a lack of understanding of what the Eastern fathers
Speaker 1: say when they define the Father as the cause.
Speaker 2: So for us, what you mean by a cause is
Speaker 2: just I think what I meant by what I meant,
Speaker 2: we're just talking about the relations of origin.
Speaker 1: That's fine, okay, okay, But but for us, it's not
Speaker 1: just a question of speculating about the trinity. For us,
Speaker 1: this is how we know God. God is known first
Speaker 1: and foremost, as Paul says, one Father. So God reveals
Speaker 1: himself to us hypostatically or personally. We don't start with
Speaker 1: reasoning back and coming up when they first cause simple essence.
Speaker 1: We start with the fact that God says, I am
Speaker 1: heat God is personal. We start our order theology is
Speaker 1: different or order theology right. We start with the Father
Speaker 1: and the Father as the sole cause or arka A. R. H.
Speaker 1: In the Greek as Basil uses, it is the cause
Speaker 1: of the son in terms of generation, and he's the
Speaker 1: cause of the spirit eternally in terms of spiration. And
Speaker 1: so that alone is the way that we distinguish the person.
Speaker 1: There's no other way. So anytime we make a statement
Speaker 1: about God, when we say how do we know who
Speaker 1: the spirit is? We say, he proceeds eternally from the
Speaker 1: Father through the son. And when we say who is
Speaker 1: the son, he's the one. He is eternally generated from
Speaker 1: the Father and eternally manifest us the spirit. Right, So
Speaker 1: those are the ways that we distinguished And anything said
Speaker 1: about God and our trinitarian theology causes imbalance. If we
Speaker 1: attribute a property, a positive property to two persons, that
Speaker 1: one of them doesn't have the spirit therefore lacks and
Speaker 1: the ability to produce a person, and this and and
Speaker 1: in other words, the Father and the Son have this
Speaker 1: this melded kind of co cause here to use the
Speaker 1: terminology of Florence, and I think the latter and council. Again,
Speaker 1: I'm going for a memory here, but it is a
Speaker 1: It is a father and the Son together signify a
Speaker 1: single principle of the spirit. To use the terminology. Yes.
Speaker 2: The reason I'm having trouble with this argument is that
Speaker 2: it's just not clear to me what what is so
Speaker 2: dire about the saying that this.
Speaker 1: Is because nothing that's said of God it doesn't produce.
Speaker 1: And when you say things about or a new person
Speaker 1: the others too.
Speaker 2: The other two are because you're you're happy with saying.
Speaker 1: You can actually you can. You can see the subordination
Speaker 1: of the spirit of the Roman Church over the last
Speaker 1: several hundred years. The Spirit is not given his proper role. Uh.
Speaker 1: And this is why you think that you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: this is I'm not trying to get off on a trail,
Speaker 1: but the Roman Church thinks that you need the payments to,
Speaker 1: you know, settle all issues. Because the idea of Pentecosts
Speaker 1: actually guiding the Spirit guiding the actual churches is is suppressed.
Speaker 1: It leads to the idea of why we need a
Speaker 1: pope because you don't understand the meaning of Pentecost and
Speaker 1: the reality of the spirit. The Spirit is just as divine.
Speaker 1: He's not lacked, he's not lacking in the ability.
Speaker 2: You don't need to convince me that the Holy Spirit
Speaker 2: is divine. All. I'm all I'm doing is I would
Speaker 2: want to deny firmly that being toward another person as
Speaker 2: towards rather than from, is somehow essential to being a
Speaker 2: divine person.
Speaker 1: I don't think he doesn't produce.
Speaker 2: I do think that following down the filioqui trail is
Speaker 2: a bit of a rabbit hole at the moment.
Speaker 1: Right, So related Philly is a result of absolutely.
Speaker 2: I understand that. So you're saying that it's a this
Speaker 2: clinching argument against divine simplicity, that divine simplicity entails the bunk,
Speaker 2: and that it's not going to work for me, because
Speaker 2: I don't think the is bunk unless it seems perfectly
Speaker 2: legit to hold divine simplicity. So, if you want to
Speaker 2: argue against h the argument that I was giving.
Speaker 1: Before, the father and the son are a co cause
Speaker 1: or a co principle together the spirit, the spirit does
Speaker 1: not have this property of producing a person. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: is subordination. So he's lacking in a property that the
Speaker 1: other two share.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I mean you could say the same thing
Speaker 2: about the right. So I don't see why that's any
Speaker 2: more problem classic because the father is that doesn't mean
Speaker 2: that the father is like better.
Speaker 1: No, you're not you're not getting the point that for
Speaker 1: the first thousand years it was normative to say that
Speaker 1: anything that we say about God's applicable to either the
Speaker 1: persons all all of them, or to the nature, or
Speaker 1: to the hy or or to them individually. So there
Speaker 1: can't be something that to share that one doesn't that
Speaker 1: produces the imbalance. There's only one cause.
Speaker 2: Of seeing the connection between those two claims. There's also
Speaker 2: everything which is predicated.
Speaker 1: Only one ark in the trinity, and it is the Father,
Speaker 1: and the Son does not share in his ark, in
Speaker 1: his hypostatic property. Billyoquism makes the son share in what
Speaker 1: makes the Father distinct, namely being the unoriginal cause of
Speaker 1: the of the Godhead.
Speaker 2: Yes, I mean, you're not gonna like this, right, but
Speaker 2: the stimistic answer to that part of the problem is
Speaker 2: going to be what makes the Father be the Father, right,
Speaker 2: is the generating of the Son in the act of knowledge,
Speaker 2: which is this diadic thing. And then what makes the
Speaker 2: Holy Spirit be the Holy Spirit is the fact that
Speaker 2: it results from the love of the two right.
Speaker 1: So again this is why you use the same argument
Speaker 1: that the Arians used, that that the Holy Spirit is
Speaker 1: a product of the will of the Father and the son.
Speaker 1: This is also the exact same argument.
Speaker 2: I'm aware that you don't like the psychological analogy, but again,
Speaker 2: can we keep the.
Speaker 1: No because because this is important because listen, Sat Gregory
Speaker 1: Poms uses the psychological analogy, but he applies it to
Speaker 1: eternal manifestation, and when he critiques the Filioc way, he says,
Speaker 1: the Romans are confused because they mistake mission for hyposthetic origin,
Speaker 1: and they also mistake eternal manifestation for hyposthetic origin. So
Speaker 1: that's why I began the talk when I mentioned Saint
Speaker 1: John Demascus talking about eternal manifestation of the spirit. It's
Speaker 1: not hyposthetic origin. It's it's John of the Mascus who
Speaker 1: makes that point in that distinction. And what's not hypothetic origin? Mhm,
Speaker 1: what's a lot hyposthetic origin? What we were just talking
Speaker 1: about with the Holy Spirit? Uh, the psycle logical analogy
Speaker 1: that you used, right, this is from Augustine and it's
Speaker 1: in you're saying.
Speaker 2: That it's not the hypostatic origin. That's a claim. I
Speaker 2: deny it.
Speaker 1: What's your argument because it doesn't work because the son
Speaker 1: takes on a property of the son, takes on the
Speaker 1: very thing that defines the father which is to be
Speaker 1: the sole archade.
Speaker 2: No, what defines the fathers to be, according to Kunas
Speaker 2: is to be right, to not be from what definess
Speaker 2: of opposition. And I said earlier that doesn't work because
Speaker 2: the other two are not from which you admitted. I
Speaker 2: can go over the text again, let's see, But okay,
Speaker 2: we've got we can keep on going and feel the
Speaker 2: oquay trail if you like.
Speaker 1: Let let's put it this way. Let's put it this way.
Speaker 1: If you read on the Orthodox Faith, which of course
Speaker 1: Aquinas you know, references many many times, you will find
Speaker 1: that everything that I'm saying and claiming is one hundred
Speaker 1: percent in line with what sam JOHNA. Mascus is arguing.
Speaker 1: And my point is just to say that.
Speaker 2: There may not be that's not really not concerned.
Speaker 1: But okay, I'm telling you to read it because you'll
Speaker 1: find my arguments are all from that and other Orthodox writers.
Speaker 1: So I'm not making arguments that are like out of
Speaker 1: my head. They're actually from maybe somebody that you would
Speaker 1: find worth reading useful right for the sake of future dialogue.
Speaker 1: I'm saying, if you read that, you'll see all my
Speaker 1: arguments are there would happily.
Speaker 2: I think the opportunity to read Saint John and the.
Speaker 1: Roman Church affirms that, right, So that affirms what he's
Speaker 1: a doctor of the church in aquas.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the doctor of the church is not to affirm
Speaker 2: everything that they that they say it's true, of course, but.
Speaker 1: I'm saying that true because he said it. I'm saying
Speaker 1: that the arguments are there and for future reference, you
Speaker 1: would if you want to understand where I'm getting all this,
Speaker 1: it's from there.
Speaker 2: Sure well, no, I appreciate that. But again, so just
Speaker 2: to recap what got us there, right, So, you're saying
Speaker 2: that divine simplicity is irreconcilable with the Trinity, because the
Speaker 2: only way that's uh that you can reconcile it with
Speaker 2: the Trinity is by subordinationism. I'm not convinced we can
Speaker 2: have we can keep on having that argument if you
Speaker 2: think that's the lynchpin.
Speaker 1: But you understand what I'm saying though. What the problem
Speaker 1: is that you don't understand our position in terms of
Speaker 1: hypostatic origins. Is the only way to explain who God is.
Speaker 1: I mean, even the idea of the Father being the
Speaker 1: cause is foreign to you, and it's common in the
Speaker 1: Eastern fathers.
Speaker 2: Uh So I was inexplicable, right, because I asked you
Speaker 2: what procession means as distinct from filiation, and you said
Speaker 2: that that's in principle unanswerable.
Speaker 1: And that's the answer of all the Eastern Fathers, and
Speaker 1: even Augustine says that we don't even know exactly what
Speaker 1: these words mean.
Speaker 2: We have to exactly what these words mean. But I'm
Speaker 2: asking you to give me some way in which, in
Speaker 2: an imperfect we can distinguish these things.
Speaker 1: I mean, we don't know how to define it. We
Speaker 1: don't know how to procession, We don't know how to
Speaker 1: find eternal generation and why these two things are different.
Speaker 1: But they are. And if you read the next several
Speaker 1: hundred centuries after Augustine of debate on this very question,
Speaker 1: what you come to find out is that the way
Speaker 1: that we distinguish the person's is different from the way
Speaker 1: Rome tries to do it. Rome tries to do it
Speaker 1: within a context of also accepting absolutely divide simplicity. We don't.
Speaker 1: And because we don't, we have the Father defined by
Speaker 1: his role as archae or soul, origin or cause of
Speaker 1: the Godhead. That means that that for him to retain
Speaker 1: his his hypostasis. He doesn't share that property of being
Speaker 1: the cause with anyone else. So that's why the son
Speaker 1: can't take on. Listen, that's why the son can't take
Speaker 1: on what is his defining hypostatic term.
Speaker 2: I understand that and the issues that we're taking two
Speaker 2: different things as being the defining note of the father.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So I'm looking right now at Dave Potentia uh nine
Speaker 2: to nine, which is on whether there are only three
Speaker 2: persons of God?
Speaker 1: Hello? Hello, what looks like we lost Hell being not born?
Speaker 1: Are you there in my computers?
Speaker 2: Having I'm looking right now at the Potensia nine nine,
Speaker 2: which I think is aquinance, is the fullest explanation of
Speaker 2: how he thinks the of the three persons are distinguished
Speaker 2: from each other.
Speaker 1: I could be wrong.
Speaker 2: About that, but so what he takes is the defining
Speaker 2: attribute of the father is not being cause of the others,
Speaker 2: which is what you are taking that right, So I
Speaker 2: grant you right. If you're gonna say that the person,
Speaker 2: then the father and the and the son would collapse
Speaker 2: into each other on the fil right.
Speaker 1: The son which defines the father.
Speaker 2: Rather, what defines the father is being, which in other words,
Speaker 2: means to not be born, right, so to not be
Speaker 2: from a cause. And that's not true if either father
Speaker 2: or son. And so it seems as that problem that
Speaker 2: you were just worried about, Uh, just depends on what
Speaker 2: you choose as the.
Speaker 1: No. I I recognize that Aquinas has a place for
Speaker 1: for forgiving the father that role. That's not what the
Speaker 1: contention is. The contention is that when when we see
Speaker 1: that as the father's only define main defining property, that the.
Speaker 2: Son or being the cause of another, that.
Speaker 1: He is unriginate and the soul. Hey, godhead, this is
Speaker 1: again the classical terminal to who the father is. And
Speaker 1: Basil and Greg renounci Azus and Gregoranissa and in the
Speaker 1: councils uh that that can't be something that the that
Speaker 1: the son shares in. Okay, and the son shares in
Speaker 1: that if he becomes also the cause of the spirit, there's.
Speaker 2: No you take the defining attribute of the father, right,
Speaker 2: So if you take the defining attribute of the father
Speaker 2: as being the cause of a person more cause, I
Speaker 2: mean like the originating toward and yeah, then there would
Speaker 2: be two fathers and that's what you're trying to avoid.
Speaker 2: But if you simply take the father to be that
Speaker 2: which is, which does not proceed, which is not from another,
Speaker 2: then there's only one, and I'm not sure what the
Speaker 2: problem is.
Speaker 1: That's just another way of saying that he is the
Speaker 1: sole cause of the Godhead. He's not from another. Okay,
Speaker 1: the other two are from another. Right, So this is
Speaker 1: really of opposition. And again I'm trying to tell you
Speaker 1: that that doesn't work as a negative definition of who
Speaker 1: these people are. Who excuse me, hypostasies are from these persons.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, again, I'm not sure what I lose by
Speaker 2: saying that he is that which is by taking the
Speaker 2: Father as that which is who gives and does not receive,
Speaker 2: taking the Son and he who gives and receives, and
Speaker 2: taking the Holy Spirit as he who receives. Right, like
Speaker 2: that seems to distinguish all three quite nicely. You can
Speaker 2: say like that receiving is common to son and spirit.
Speaker 2: You can say if you like that giving is common
Speaker 2: to father and son. But these are different kinds of giving,
Speaker 2: in their different kinds of receivings, just like you said.
Speaker 1: Right, So Aquanas talks about sometimes the Roman categorich we'll
Speaker 1: talk about the Father is the principal source of the
Speaker 1: Godhead and then the son as a secondary source when
Speaker 1: we talk about the spiration, and what we say is
Speaker 1: that that's impossible because number one, the son can't participate
Speaker 1: in the father's hypostasis, and number two, it gives two
Speaker 1: persons a positive property that the spirit doesn't have.
Speaker 2: So I get what you're saying. What I'm just going
Speaker 2: to argue what I was saying, which is I don't
Speaker 2: think I'm well, let me say it a different way.
Speaker 2: I don't think I'm giving any of the persons a
Speaker 2: real positive property something which exists.
Speaker 1: Uh, the Father and the son produced the spirit.
Speaker 2: Yes, right, this is the common medication.
Speaker 1: That's a real positive property that the spirit doesn't have.
Speaker 2: So maybe this is getting into the problems of divine
Speaker 2: predication or just the problems of predication in general. So
Speaker 2: what a client is going to claim is that not
Speaker 2: all of your just the fact that you can use
Speaker 2: the same word for something, it doesn't mean that there
Speaker 2: is in both cases the same reality corresponding isomorphically to
Speaker 2: your word.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So quint is this going to say that there's two
Speaker 2: relations in the father, one to the son and one
Speaker 2: to the spirit, right, because I would mean that the
Speaker 2: Father was too subsistently. What you've got in the case
Speaker 2: of the Father is one relation which is not from
Speaker 2: and toward period, and what you've got in the Son
Speaker 2: is a relation of from and toward right received giving,
Speaker 2: and the way you've got in the Holy Spirit is
Speaker 2: a relation of reception. There's no real thing which is shared,
Speaker 2: although I can speak of the Son and spirit received.
Speaker 1: Think the Father and the Father and the Son really
Speaker 1: produces spirit.
Speaker 2: Do you say that the Son and the Holy Spirit
Speaker 2: really receive the Father.
Speaker 1: We don't use any of this, gobly Gi because we
Speaker 1: don't believe tonism, but I'm we have, but we have
Speaker 1: a way of distinguishing.
Speaker 2: I'm just saying that receiving is as much of a
Speaker 2: positive predicate as giving, and whether or not you have.
Speaker 1: That because you affirm hypostatic origin supposedly Roman Caviolts do
Speaker 1: supposedly does. And for the Spirit it is said to
Speaker 1: be from the Father and the Son as a single principle.
Speaker 1: There's no single principle in God that two persons shared
Speaker 1: that the other one doesn't. It's a very simple argument.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, and I agree with that.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: I'm saying that there is no metaphysical reality which father
Speaker 2: has and which father and son both are.
Speaker 1: Yes, there is. Your councils say together they constitute a
Speaker 1: single principle of the spiration of the spirit in terms
Speaker 1: of this hyposthetic origin. So that.
Speaker 2: No, because we won't say that the there isn't no
Speaker 2: act of causing. Right, there's relations of tor and there's
Speaker 2: relations of from the standards missing model in this right
Speaker 2: is that you have.
Speaker 1: Well, you can throw out the word cause and you
Speaker 1: can just say he's the principal source. The father and
Speaker 1: the son in the Roman Catholic dogmas are said to
Speaker 1: together a single source of the hypostasis of the spirit.
Speaker 2: I'm okay with that. That is directly what you said,
Speaker 2: a what's it, right, A property like whiteness or greenness
Speaker 2: or relation or whatever, which is real in both father
Speaker 2: and son. Again, just as you would not want to say,
Speaker 2: that's simply the fact that both son and spirit are
Speaker 2: from or are or proceed let's say, from the father.
Speaker 2: You're willing to say that, right, that both father and
Speaker 2: son proceed from the Father.
Speaker 1: No, absolutely not, because proceed is In the Greek the
Speaker 1: eperusis is a specific term that defines who the spirit is,
Speaker 1: and generation is specific to who the son is. Okay,
Speaker 1: is the word we don't. We don't use these common
Speaker 1: attributes of well, both are from another, right, we don't
Speaker 1: do relations of opposition.
Speaker 2: Look, that's fine. I mean if you want to say
Speaker 2: that this you're talking about cause, right, So you're using
Speaker 2: this word cause. Yes, father causes the quote unquote.
Speaker 1: The fathers and their councils use this term of the father.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: That's fine. But but you're going with that, right. Is
Speaker 2: there a correlative?
Speaker 1: By the way, they don't. They don't use the Ariscitilian
Speaker 1: tomistic view of this. That's fine.
Speaker 2: Are you going to grant that there is a correlative
Speaker 2: to cause which is being caused?
Speaker 1: Oh? Yeah, okay, correlative? Is it is true to say, listen,
Speaker 1: it is true to say that the son and the
Speaker 1: spirit are from another. That's true. True, that's fine. All
Speaker 1: we're saying is that that that is not what defines
Speaker 1: the persons. And lets us know the distinctions of the hypostats, all.
Speaker 2: Right, but simply being to another is not what defines
Speaker 2: the persons in domistic theology, either another and not from But.
Speaker 1: You again understand that it's not supposed to be too.
Speaker 1: But the whole dogma interjects a new principle into the trinity,
Speaker 1: of the Father and the Son together constituting a single
Speaker 1: hyposthetic source of the spirit. So you have a new
Speaker 1: principle of a diad introduced into the trinity, and there
Speaker 1: is no diet. It's always whatever is true is true
Speaker 1: of the persons or of God as a whole. That's
Speaker 1: straight up classic orthodox trinitarianism. I'm saying orthodox in the
Speaker 1: general sense.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't. I'm trying to think of a way
Speaker 2: to save us without just repeating myself again.
Speaker 1: You're admitting hyposthetic properties and causes or origins we calls
Speaker 1: that's standard timistic trinitarian theology. Mm hmm. And the origin
Speaker 1: of the spirit is from a father and son as
Speaker 1: one principle. Correct.
Speaker 2: My knowledge of the coin is is Strinitarian theology is
Speaker 2: not sufficient to allow me to say yes to the
Speaker 2: as from.
Speaker 1: It's may be to check. He does say that the
Speaker 1: barbercal but I don't have the sumo on hand. So
Speaker 1: but anyway, I don't think we're gonna.
Speaker 2: I would be really hesitant to say that.
Speaker 1: I would be surprised. That's the dogmatical to the teaching.
Speaker 2: But I would be surprised if he thinks of father
Speaker 2: and son as together doing.
Speaker 1: One what's it?
Speaker 2: H again, but there is no action which is coming
Speaker 2: out of either one of them, right, Uh? In this theology,
Speaker 2: there's just relations of to and from. So again there's
Speaker 2: there's no like source of so that you're you're talking
Speaker 2: about a diad being.
Speaker 1: Like a again the reason that producing a third thing.
Speaker 2: And I just think that's the wrong way to think
Speaker 2: about this.
Speaker 1: Now, it's not the wrong way, it's the right way
Speaker 1: because that's how the Eastern Fathers all categorize it, and
Speaker 1: that's how it's used not just in the councils, but
Speaker 1: also when it comes to Christology.
Speaker 2: I'm saying that that's the wrong way to understand what
Speaker 2: a quite is saying.
Speaker 1: Ah anyway, yeah, so do we want to maybe move to?
Speaker 1: So what's that? Do we want to move on? I mean,
Speaker 1: we're just going to keep going, I think, in circles
Speaker 1: about this because you know, so.
Speaker 2: Maybe even Re Saint John Damascene is going to convince
Speaker 2: me that the filioquay is so bad that it's this
Speaker 2: tremendous roadblock to to any divine simplicity theory. But at
Speaker 2: the moment it seems to me that being able to like,
Speaker 2: I'm not feeling the problem of saying that both father
Speaker 2: and son can be said to spire it because again
Speaker 2: this does not name a real relation, according to Aquinas,
Speaker 2: and so like maybe I should, I would only be
Speaker 2: moved by it at the moment. If to spire eight
Speaker 2: were said to be a real relation defining a person
Speaker 2: for Aquinas, that would be inconsistent.
Speaker 1: Aquinas does not hold that.
Speaker 2: But okay, so let me just let's backtle from this,
Speaker 2: can I can I ask you another question about the energies. Okay,
Speaker 2: So the central the central problem, like I was saying earlier,
Speaker 2: thought a Toomas is going to have with talking about
Speaker 2: energies is if energy are in some way going to
Speaker 2: be positing something in the subject. Right, It's the regular
Speaker 2: accidents like wisdom injustice. Right, So when I say that
Speaker 2: I have these right, they are from me, right, they
Speaker 2: exist in me, but they also posit something in me
Speaker 2: if they make me be a certain way.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So if we were to take energies in that sense,
Speaker 2: the Thomas is going to be very worried, right, because
Speaker 2: it's going to seem as though you're filling a slot
Speaker 2: or an opening or something in God that the divine
Speaker 2: nature of itself doesn't have. Now, I presume that's not
Speaker 2: what you're saying, right, do you want to characterize how
Speaker 2: your understanding of energy as avoids that? How is predicating
Speaker 2: wisdom as an energy of God different from predicating wisdom
Speaker 2: as an accident of me?
Speaker 1: Because we don't identify This is the point I was
Speaker 1: making earlier about analogical predication. We don't identify the predicates
Speaker 1: with the divine essence, would then makes them meaningless. We
Speaker 1: say that the predicates are analogical to the energies, which
Speaker 1: are not the divine essence. That was an answer your question,
Speaker 1: because what you're talking about with you is actually an
Speaker 1: argument that Nissa uses when he says that how do
Speaker 1: we understand the difference between act or energy, h and
Speaker 1: will and nature in person? He says, well, let's look
Speaker 1: at a human person. Right, There's there's an action that's
Speaker 1: distinct from the person. The person builds a house that's
Speaker 1: an effect of the work that he did. We might
Speaker 1: learn something about that person, but we don't perceive his
Speaker 1: nature or directly know his hypostasis. By looking at the
Speaker 1: house that he built, we might learn a few things
Speaker 1: about him when we when we interact with that person directly,
Speaker 1: we interact with his hypostasis, which is makes what makes
Speaker 1: him distinct. And we understand that perhaps we share a
Speaker 1: common nature between me and so you have you, mister
Speaker 1: duarct Fingeld, have a human nature that I share. But
Speaker 1: I'm the hypostasis Jay, You're the hypostasis, uh duc Feingel.
Speaker 1: So doesn't now. So the Eastern Fathers make these analogies
Speaker 1: right to who God is, and they say that in
Speaker 1: the same way that a man creates a building, and
Speaker 1: we might learn about him and his wisdom and his
Speaker 1: works that are proper to human nature through creating a house.
Speaker 1: In the same way, there's an analogy to God creating
Speaker 1: the world, and his energy and act of creating the
Speaker 1: world is distinct from who he is in his essence.
Speaker 1: Because if we said that the act of creating the
Speaker 1: world was the same as the divine us, since we
Speaker 1: would be led to all kinds of absurdities, such as
Speaker 1: that the creation of the world is exactly the same
Speaker 1: as the conflagration, because both are divine actions. So what
Speaker 1: we say is that the energies of God are the
Speaker 1: things around him. This is the way Thatsius, the Areopagus,
Speaker 1: the Saint Basils sat Gregory, Saint this as they all
Speaker 1: say that. It's the way to understand this is to
Speaker 1: look at when Moses goes up on the mountain, and
Speaker 1: we're told in Exodus that Moses saw God face to face.
Speaker 1: But no man can see God face to face and live.
Speaker 1: So how is this possible? What's possible because that the Theophanes,
Speaker 1: the manifestations of God, the energies of God within history
Speaker 1: that operate can at times even be made visible if
Speaker 1: God so chooses to Right.
Speaker 2: So I mean all of that you're describing, it's completely
Speaker 2: compatible with what it Quita says about the vine simplicity.
Speaker 1: Right, No, it's not at all.
Speaker 2: Sure it is because it absolutely maintains.
Speaker 1: That the apes are not real in your doctrine.
Speaker 2: I don't know what you mean by that.
Speaker 1: So you don't believe that, you don't believe that, you
Speaker 1: don't believe that God's goodness was manifest distinct from the
Speaker 1: essence of God. Mostes didn't see the essence of God.
Speaker 2: Manifestations of God's goodness are distinct from the essence of God.
Speaker 1: Right, So look only because you believe they're created effects
Speaker 1: though you don't believe that it's actually the goodness of God.
Speaker 1: You believe that it's a created hologram or effective God.
Speaker 1: This is why RAS intends to not believe that the
Speaker 1: Angel of the Lord it was the preincarnate logos, because
Speaker 1: that's that's impossible and absolute divine simplicity.
Speaker 2: It seems to me that you're trying to hold two
Speaker 2: incompatible things. So let me try to parse this out.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you to argue, is revealed right that the
Speaker 1: are the logos pre incarnate hold on person become can
Speaker 1: become manifest within time and space.
Speaker 2: Yes, I know that the person become manifest and time
Speaker 2: and space.
Speaker 1: But you don't believe that, sure, I know you don't.
Speaker 1: You don't believe that the ansl of the Lord was
Speaker 1: the logos. The Roman Catholic doctrine is that those are
Speaker 1: created holograms and not Christ himself. That's why you believe
Speaker 1: that the light of Mount Table has created light.
Speaker 2: Well, let's rewind a little bit, okay, so and we
Speaker 2: can talk about how to make I've.
Speaker 1: Never met a Catholics that the Theophanies were real or
Speaker 1: that the light of Matthew seventeen the transfiguration was uncreated
Speaker 1: like every Roman Catholic I've ever met. But but you've said,
Speaker 1: like I've ever read.
Speaker 2: That I was saying. Finus agrees with one hundred percent
Speaker 2: is what you said at the beginning, which is that
Speaker 2: these things which you are calling energies are not attributes
Speaker 2: of God in the sense of things that modify him
Speaker 2: or exist in him to sink from his essence, but
Speaker 2: rather there are things that show up in his works.
Speaker 1: Saint Basil and Saint Gregorissa use the analogy of the
Speaker 1: sun and its heat and its h right, So the sun,
Speaker 1: the heat and its rays can be genuinely distinguished, but
Speaker 1: they're not exactly the same. We don't believe that the
Speaker 1: fore knowledge of God is exactly the same as the
Speaker 1: wisdom of God, or the love of God, or the
Speaker 1: justice of God. Like the equating the foregn knowledge of
Speaker 1: God with the justice of God makes no sense.
Speaker 2: Okay, so this is I want to get into that
Speaker 2: argument in a minute, okay, and quick question, so I
Speaker 2: know how to pace myself or what's left? How much
Speaker 2: time do we have left on this?
Speaker 1: I probably need to go pretty soon. We can set
Speaker 1: up like a part two though, if you want but
Speaker 1: you've been going for how long have we been going?
Speaker 2: Then our hour and fifty minutes?
Speaker 1: I think, okay, so let's say two hours and then
Speaker 1: maybe we can pick up at a part two if
Speaker 1: you want to do it.
Speaker 2: Sure sounds good. Yeah, so I think which I was
Speaker 2: trying to get out with the energy thing. Right, So
Speaker 2: what a Coitas wants to deny, which I would want
Speaker 2: to deny with them, is that that's something you picked
Speaker 2: justice in four and knowledge. So let's go with that,
Speaker 2: all right, I would want he would want to deny
Speaker 2: that these things manifested in the world. Right, So let's
Speaker 2: say the justice of the nation of sinners, or the
Speaker 2: justice or the fore knowledge manifested in prophecy or whatever.
Speaker 1: He would want to deny that these.
Speaker 2: Manifestations are attributes existing in God in the way in
Speaker 2: which I described quantities and qualities as existing in their subjects. Right,
Speaker 2: does that make sense? In other words, they don't pose it.
Speaker 2: What you just described, what Aquitans is holding with divine
Speaker 2: simplicity is the same.
Speaker 1: In this respect.
Speaker 2: Neither of you seems to me want to say that
Speaker 2: there is something in God distinct from the essence, which
Speaker 2: is nonetheless makes God be a certain way.
Speaker 1: Can we agree about that? As far as I understand
Speaker 1: your meaning, I'm not sure.
Speaker 2: There's no so in my soul, there's a little do
Speaker 2: hickey if you like. The virtue of justice, which I
Speaker 2: wasn't born with, it doesn't come with my soul, Please God,
Speaker 2: I've acquired a little bit of it over the course
Speaker 2: of the last thirty years, and it makes me be
Speaker 2: in a certain way. And it's distinct from me. Right.
Speaker 2: That's not what you mean by energies, right. What you
Speaker 2: mean by energy in my case would be something like
Speaker 2: I do something just right, and that shows you.
Speaker 1: Most of the time, for example, what you.
Speaker 2: Actually see is my just action. Am I getting that right?
Speaker 1: Correct? For example, in the New Testament, when inner gaia
Speaker 1: is used, it's it's for example, when Paul talks about
Speaker 1: the operations of the spirit, right, So the energy of
Speaker 1: the spirit is when he's talking about like the gifts
Speaker 1: of the spirit. So when the spirit grants prophecy, when
Speaker 1: he grants mercy to different gifts to the saints, the
Speaker 1: charismatic gifts. I don't mean charismaticism, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: The word that's used there is inner gaya, which just
Speaker 1: signifies divine operations or actions. Yeah, and sometimes yes, we
Speaker 1: would say that if you're talking about the attributes the
Speaker 1: love of God, we believe that is an energy, and
Speaker 1: we even believe that the knowledge that we have that
Speaker 1: God's essence is one is also an energetic truth that
Speaker 1: we learned through vind revelation. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So I if I'm trying to make sense of what
Speaker 2: you're saying and transporting it into my categories, I think
Speaker 2: I kind of sent to a lot of it. But
Speaker 2: it's going to sound like this, So tell me if
Speaker 2: you've got problems with this translation. So it seems as
Speaker 2: though you want to say that the energy can refer
Speaker 2: to when I speak of the energy of God's justice
Speaker 2: or of his unity or whatever. What you mean is
Speaker 2: not that there is an attribute distinct from the divine
Speaker 2: essence which adheres in the divine essence, but rather one
Speaker 2: of two things. And maybe you think that you said
Speaker 2: the same thing. They don't sound the same to me.
Speaker 1: Oh.
Speaker 2: Thing one would be there's a work done in creation
Speaker 2: which manifests that which I am calling God's justice right,
Speaker 2: So that would be like the punishment of this sinner,
Speaker 2: And the other one would be the content which I
Speaker 2: am predicating of God. Right, So when I say it right,
Speaker 2: so you've got thing one, that's this thing which happened
Speaker 2: right here, the ciner got punished. And then there's thing too,
Speaker 2: which is as a result of seeing this, I predicate
Speaker 2: this concept that I have of justice of God. And
Speaker 2: I don't want to say that this concept that I
Speaker 2: have of justice is like a concept of God, but
Speaker 2: I do want to say that I can predicate it
Speaker 2: of Him. And so because you want to, on the
Speaker 2: one hand, deny that what I've got in my mind
Speaker 2: of justice equals God, but on the other hand, you
Speaker 2: want to affirm that it gets to God somehow. You
Speaker 2: call this an energy, and this is an energy in
Speaker 2: a different sense from the actual work of damning the center.
Speaker 2: Is that all sound fair?
Speaker 1: So far? Well? I laid out three distinctions at the beginning,
Speaker 1: where I was talking about the energies of God as
Speaker 1: relating to eternal manifestation, the energies of God relating to creation,
Speaker 1: and then some energies that let's just.
Speaker 2: Stick with the things like justice and fore knowledge for
Speaker 2: the moment.
Speaker 1: Well, there's a sense in which I mean, you could
Speaker 1: say God is even and that's where I wanted this
Speaker 1: double distinction to show up.
Speaker 2: Okay, well you get trinitarian stuff and leaving aside hypostatic
Speaker 2: union stuff.
Speaker 1: And all that. Well, but I want to stress for
Speaker 1: us all these things are related, because you're not going
Speaker 1: to have the essence energy distinction without the proper doctrine
Speaker 1: of the Father as the ark and the right order theologiate.
Speaker 1: So it's not like these things operate in in and
Speaker 1: discreete from the other other doctrines. They all hang or
Speaker 1: fall together. I'll bear that in mind.
Speaker 2: And so tell me if I'm if my lumping things,
Speaker 2: or if I if I'm saying something which would be
Speaker 2: corrected by bringing in some of the other sides. So
Speaker 2: what Acquittance would want to say?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: So, in this case of understanding seeing God's justice and
Speaker 2: predicating it of him, right, we'll you'll deny that there
Speaker 2: is a what sit which is up there in God,
Speaker 2: which is distinct from God's essence to which I am
Speaker 2: referring when I say that God is just. What he
Speaker 2: would affirm is that there are three things involved. There
Speaker 2: is the action which is just, There is my concept
Speaker 2: of justice, and there's the divine essence, which bears some
Speaker 2: sort of resemblance to my concept.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it doesn't. And that's the whole point. Because
Speaker 1: the things you had are particular, and they're discrete, and
Speaker 1: they're related to things in time and space and history
Speaker 1: and the absolutely simple essence which is supposedly identical to
Speaker 1: divine justice, God's justice. There's no way to know that
Speaker 1: that's what you're experiencing or bridging that gap, because all
Speaker 1: you know is all you know is creative effects. Right.
Speaker 2: So, but I mean so, but that's true of this
Speaker 2: isn't just true of God?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: So we know all things through their operations, right, I
Speaker 2: don't have any direct access to you, right, to you
Speaker 2: the operation of talking.
Speaker 1: Right, that's how you and I know each other. But
Speaker 1: it's not just created effects. In terms of knowing God,
Speaker 1: and in terms of knowing God, it's beyond creative effects.
Speaker 1: That was what was true generally for the Old Testament period,
Speaker 1: signs and symbols. Now we see Christ face to face,
Speaker 1: as Paul says and said, dudes, three, that's right. No,
Speaker 1: you believe in the beatific vision. You don't believe we
Speaker 1: see Christ face to face.
Speaker 2: I believe that what it means to say that I
Speaker 2: see Christ face to face now is different from what
Speaker 2: it means to see Christ face to face in the
Speaker 2: beertopic vision, if that's what you mean.
Speaker 1: Right, because now it's only creative effects.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we're mixing issues again. I think one of
Speaker 2: the things I know that is the justice my life,
Speaker 2: and I know that this is big for Palamas and
Speaker 2: the original.
Speaker 1: How do you know that it's the justice of God
Speaker 1: and not the foregnoledge or love of God that you're experiencing.
Speaker 2: So Colonus would say, depending on what you mean by that,
Speaker 2: that's uh.
Speaker 1: Well, I think it matters whether I'm under God's justice.
Speaker 2: Like, hold on, if you're talking about right, so I
Speaker 2: can say this action right, So let's say that this
Speaker 2: action here seems to exemplify uh, God's or or whatever. Right,
Speaker 2: So the center gets failed like twenty times and gets
Speaker 2: this huge insects of grace and conversion. Okay, what is
Speaker 2: it that allows me to say that the name mercy
Speaker 2: is most applicable to this situation? It would be because
Speaker 2: what I see of this situation most maps of my
Speaker 2: creaturely concept of mercy.
Speaker 1: But to say that your creaturely concepts are analogous right
Speaker 1: to something that is completely unlike the things that you
Speaker 1: think you have. Like in other words, the divine justice
Speaker 1: is not like human justice.
Speaker 2: Right, of course I'm going to object to completely unlike
Speaker 2: of course.
Speaker 1: But so so it's analogous. It's an analogy. But the
Speaker 1: thing that you that you're making an analogy to is
Speaker 1: absolutely simple, that's right, and all and all the predicates
Speaker 1: are actually identified. So how do you know that you're
Speaker 1: actually experiencing one or the other because they're not really distinct.
Speaker 2: Right, So it depends on what you mean by what
Speaker 2: you're experiencing. Right, if you're saying that I'm experiencing God, right,
Speaker 2: so if you're asking which part of God I'm experiencing it,
Speaker 2: I'm saying that is experiencing any part of God, because
Speaker 2: God doesn't have parts. But if you're asking why am
Speaker 2: I applying this name to this manifestation, it's because this
Speaker 2: manifestation captures more of this concept that I have than
Speaker 2: of that concept. Yeah, I don't see a problem.
Speaker 1: That bridge between the concept and the thing. There's no
Speaker 1: bridge between the concept and the absolutely simple essence. You
Speaker 1: never know that actual thing. You only know creative effects,
Speaker 1: and you don't know I never You don't know if
Speaker 1: your creative effects match up to this thing. How can they?
Speaker 1: So this is why Palamas calls it atheism.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, So I'm not going to say repeat
Speaker 2: what you said right before that last thing.
Speaker 1: All that you experience in your life or the created
Speaker 1: effects of this this super monad essence, you never experience
Speaker 1: a direct example of God himself or God's justice within
Speaker 1: time and space. You only experience creative effects of God.
Speaker 1: And so when you talk about the love of God,
Speaker 1: or the fore knowledge of God or the mercy of God,
Speaker 1: you're not actually talking about something that you know that
Speaker 1: you've experienced. You're only talking about a creaturely analogue that
Speaker 1: that you hope matches up to this absolutely simple essence,
Speaker 1: wherein all of the attributes are the exact same, So
Speaker 1: it's meaningless.
Speaker 2: The problem is the word I think that we're using
Speaker 2: talk about in two different senses. Right, So there.
Speaker 1: Doesn't work if absolutely divind simplicity is true, that's the
Speaker 1: crux of the argument, because all of the things that
Speaker 1: you're talking about are not like an absolutely simple essence.
Speaker 1: One creaturely effect is just you're just interpreting a creaturely
Speaker 1: effect compared to some other creaturely effect. Yeah, so figure
Speaker 1: out where to start hearing again.
Speaker 2: All right, So look, I just disagree with your claim,
Speaker 2: and then we'll see if I can give a principle
Speaker 2: of reason for disagree with it. I just disagree with
Speaker 2: the claim that if X is limited and why is
Speaker 2: infinite and per se rather than participate participated that it
Speaker 2: follows that X is that there is no similarity whatsoever
Speaker 2: between X and all you.
Speaker 1: All you know is creative effects, and you never know
Speaker 1: that thing itself, so you have no reference for it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, when I say, let's let's try to give concrete examples, right.
Speaker 1: That is the analogy andthis right.
Speaker 2: Mm hmm, I'm not quite sure how you think these words,
Speaker 2: So let me just try to give concrete examples, and
Speaker 2: let's see where we part way.
Speaker 1: The analogy andthis and aquitas analogae of being, right, is
Speaker 1: that there's a we can look at the world, we
Speaker 1: can see being. We can predicate that God is the
Speaker 1: super being. But of course he doesn't have being in
Speaker 1: the exact same way as everything else has being, because
Speaker 1: the being in this world is composite. It's caused. The
Speaker 1: being that God has is the super being that's uncaused
Speaker 1: and not composite. Right, So there's there's an assumption of analogy, right,
Speaker 1: and we're not using unibical predication. We're using analogy, right.
Speaker 2: I Mean the idea is that's supposed to be the
Speaker 2: same thing signified, but different mode of signification. And that's
Speaker 2: your classic line.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So let me just try to give an example.
Speaker 1: So when I say that you.
Speaker 2: Are loving or whatever, right, so I don't have access
Speaker 2: to the habit of love which is in your soul,
Speaker 2: but I do have access to the actions by which
Speaker 2: you work for the good of others, right, and so
Speaker 2: on the basis of your doing these actions, I creditate
Speaker 2: love of you. Where love means that in you by
Speaker 2: virtue of which you will the good for others, and
Speaker 2: you see you seek their good.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So and in us this that by which you will
Speaker 2: and you seek work for the good of others, is
Speaker 2: this extra little habit which is added on to your soul,
Speaker 2: and which is different from the habit of wisdom, as
Speaker 2: evidenced by the fact that you can have one without
Speaker 2: the other.
Speaker 1: We just don't use these categories.
Speaker 2: I'm just trying to explain what, okay, And so when
Speaker 2: I talk about God's having love, it would be the
Speaker 2: same same sort of deal in this respect. And I
Speaker 2: don't have access to God's love. I don't see inside
Speaker 2: his essence. What I have access to, just like you said,
Speaker 2: is are these manifestations I see God becoming man and
Speaker 2: dying on the.
Speaker 1: Cross for us.
Speaker 2: I'm not quite done yet. And because of this right,
Speaker 2: so I say when I say that God is has love,
Speaker 2: is love, what I mean is that there is in
Speaker 2: God that by which he does this act, which is
Speaker 2: seeking the good, of seeking the good of others. It's
Speaker 2: just that in this case, that by which he does
Speaker 2: this operation is not an extra little what's it which
Speaker 2: is added on to him?
Speaker 1: It's just him.
Speaker 2: And I can't fathom that. But that's what I means.
Speaker 2: That's why I predicate the same word of me and
Speaker 2: of you and of God. Yeah, analogic categories, that's fine,
Speaker 2: But I understrying to make sense of what what we're saying, like,
Speaker 2: why we think that it makes sense to apply the term,
Speaker 2: uh loving, let's say to God.
Speaker 1: But you're only looking at created analogs and none of
Speaker 1: those things are the thing itself. So you don't actually
Speaker 1: know that God has loved? Do I know that you
Speaker 1: have love? Yeah? But but knowing that I have love,
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that you know Godhill, because how do I
Speaker 1: another creative effect?
Speaker 2: How do I know that you have love.
Speaker 1: Because you have a personal interaction with me and you're
Speaker 1: in your doctrine.
Speaker 2: It's not, Well, what do I have to have a
Speaker 2: personal interaction with you to know that you have love?
Speaker 1: Well, you might hear secondhand from somebody, But the point
Speaker 1: is that that we're not we're talking about God himself.
Speaker 2: Right. Well, no, but I'm saying that both of these
Speaker 2: things right, So it can be right soon case of
Speaker 2: you and me. Right, it can be the case that
Speaker 2: I see you doing something good to another, or I
Speaker 2: can see you doing something good to me, like taking
Speaker 2: these two hours out of your day to talk to me. Right,
Speaker 2: And both of these give me right allow me to
Speaker 2: predicate with you something which I don't directly see. But
Speaker 2: how do you know that that is God showing love
Speaker 2: to you as opposed to somebody else? No, if God
Speaker 2: is an absolutely simple essence, you don't know what. You
Speaker 2: don't know that you're actually experiencing any of these things.
Speaker 2: You can only do analogical predication because of the effect
Speaker 2: and the thing which I am seeing, which who don't know.
Speaker 1: You don't know that that created effect is an action
Speaker 1: of love, because you don't know God himself.
Speaker 2: But I think you're getting the sequence of questions backwards, right,
Speaker 2: So what I mean by love just is right that
Speaker 2: by which you do this kind.
Speaker 1: Of operation, you don't know that God is doing that.
Speaker 2: I don't I mean, I don't know that this operation
Speaker 2: that I see in front of me is an active love.
Speaker 1: Is that what you're saying, You don't know that God
Speaker 1: is doing that act of love because God is outside
Speaker 1: of time and space and absolutely simple according to this doctrine.
Speaker 2: So what you're saying, it could be for all I know,
Speaker 2: it could be somebody else.
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe God is exacting justice on you. You don't know,
Speaker 1: because atributes are the exact same as the essence, and
Speaker 1: all the attributes are synonymous with one another. You never
Speaker 1: know God or what you're actually experiencing within history is
Speaker 1: from God.
Speaker 2: I don't see how that follows at all. Right, So
Speaker 2: it seems as though it's perfectly possible for one and
Speaker 2: the same form that I just on the level of creatures.
Speaker 2: Forget God for the moment, just on the level of creature,
Speaker 2: it's perfectly possible for one and the same, but the
Speaker 2: reasoning creatures hold on. It's perfectly possible for one in
Speaker 2: the same form to be responsible for different operations, unless
Speaker 2: for different manifestations, and to give does that work for God?
Speaker 1: You can't. You can't reason that up to God like
Speaker 1: Thomas want to do. I'm telling you what I'm trying
Speaker 1: to argue is that the analogia doesn't work in your
Speaker 1: view because God is absolutely simple. If you believe in
Speaker 1: the essen synergy distinction, it would work. No, no, but
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to repeat but the divine essence. Therefore,
Speaker 1: within time and space, you don't actually experience God's love
Speaker 1: or God's mercy. You don't know what you're experiencing if
Speaker 1: you're experiencing God at all, because all you experience in
Speaker 1: creative effects. There's no analogue between what's in your mind
Speaker 1: and the absolutely simple essence Word. All the acts, tributes
Speaker 1: are melded into one giant monead. I don't know.
Speaker 2: Bear with me for a second. Tell me which part
Speaker 2: of this picture you're being bothered by. Okay, so I
Speaker 2: see this. Let's say I'm Adam. Okay, and let's say
Speaker 2: I know whether let's say, by revelation whatever that God
Speaker 2: just made this place, and he gave me all this
Speaker 2: stuff up to and including this helpmate who's pretty awesome.
Speaker 1: Uh, for my good.
Speaker 2: That's definitionally an act of love, right, I'm how you
Speaker 2: know that God did that out of love. Let's say
Speaker 2: God said that.
Speaker 1: Well, now you're relying on that, which is what we
Speaker 1: would agree. Yeah, you should rely on revelation. You can't
Speaker 1: rely on all these creative effects.
Speaker 2: Okay, let me see if I can restate it. So
Speaker 2: to say that something is an act of love, right,
Speaker 2: it means that it is done conscious right, It's not
Speaker 2: done randomly, It's done.
Speaker 1: Deliberately for the good of another.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, And so what you're asking is, how is
Speaker 2: it that I can tell that this act that is
Speaker 2: the creation of the world around me is an act
Speaker 2: which was deliberate and which was done for my good.
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know how many times I can
Speaker 1: restate the argument. It's because it's a very simple argue.
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to do anything.
Speaker 2: Are you denying that? I just want to guess right now.
Speaker 1: No, I believe that God created the world in love, absolutely,
Speaker 1: But that's because there's a direct bridge between God in
Speaker 1: the world.
Speaker 2: That I was asking, though, Right, So I'm just saying
Speaker 2: this thing out here. Maybe this is the trouble.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So you're saying that you can only know whether something
Speaker 2: counts as an act of love if I have some
Speaker 2: sort of direct, independent access to the source from which
Speaker 2: it sprang. And I'm saying that works exactly the opposite way,
Speaker 2: and that I assume that I infer you like that
Speaker 2: there is a source from which it sprang if I
Speaker 2: see the operation.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So, I don't have any direct access to your love,
Speaker 2: and I never will. All that I have access to
Speaker 2: is your operations of love. And I know that whenever
Speaker 2: there is an operation, there is corresponding to it something
Speaker 2: by virtue of which this operation happened. And that's something
Speaker 2: I call the happen of love. And it's exactly I mean, God,
Speaker 2: It's just that in the case of God, that habit
Speaker 2: isn't a.
Speaker 1: Happen You're just stating the position. You're not addressing the point,
Speaker 1: which is that the God that you're talking about is
Speaker 1: absolutely simple and all the action identified. Right.
Speaker 2: But what I'm trying to say is to call this
Speaker 2: act an act of love, I don't need to already
Speaker 2: know what it sprang from the direction of inference goes
Speaker 2: the other way. It seems as though you're saying, in
Speaker 2: order you know that this is an act of love,
Speaker 2: I have to first I have access to that from which.
Speaker 1: You're reasoning up from creatures, and you're saying creaturely loves us,
Speaker 1: that there's some ultimately divine love, and I'm saying that
Speaker 1: that doesn't work, because, for one, what you say God
Speaker 1: is in terms of absolute divine simplicity bears no resemblance
Speaker 1: to the creaturely love that you're trying to make it
Speaker 1: analogous to.
Speaker 2: And that's just what I fail to see, because it
Speaker 2: seems like the reason all the actions your idea for
Speaker 2: me God good for me, because all of the attributes
Speaker 2: are identified with the divine essence and the distinctions are
Speaker 2: only creaturely.
Speaker 1: So if the distinctions are only creaturely, you never know
Speaker 1: if the creaturely idea in your head actually matches up
Speaker 1: to the absolutely simple essence that it's supposed to mirror.
Speaker 2: Let's see, there's another way I can do this. It
Speaker 2: seems to me that you're what you're presupposing here is
Speaker 2: that in order for a predication of a term to
Speaker 2: be truly predicated of a subject, the term has to
Speaker 2: be some morphic in content with some discrete reality in
Speaker 2: the subject.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 2: So in other words, in order for me to say
Speaker 2: that you are just, there has to be something in
Speaker 2: you which is has just something real, something distinct from
Speaker 2: all the other the rest of the parts of you,
Speaker 2: which has just what I mean by the word justice
Speaker 2: and nothing else. Are you committed to that.
Speaker 1: I'm kind of getting a little flustered here, not because
Speaker 1: I just I think we're going around and around in circles.
Speaker 1: Because you're just restating what analogical predication is, and I'm
Speaker 1: asking you to explain how you can really predicate a
Speaker 1: god if all of the attributes of God and the
Speaker 1: names of God are absolutely identical to the divine essence and.
Speaker 2: You and I'm doing my best to explain that, but
Speaker 2: I'm just trying to.
Speaker 1: Make sure that you're just restating what analogical predication is,
Speaker 1: and I know what it is.
Speaker 2: So I'm just asking you to agree with me or
Speaker 2: disagree as I go, so I know where I need
Speaker 2: to need to set up my my battle lines. Are
Speaker 2: you committed to saying that the in order for true
Speaker 2: predication to happen. The formal content of my the termine
Speaker 2: predicating has to be exactly co extensive with a real thing,
Speaker 2: the subject.
Speaker 1: We don't believe in unibical predication.
Speaker 2: Okay, So if that's the case, why can't it be
Speaker 2: that two of my terms should have a formal content
Speaker 2: which is less then, uh than they're referent to which
Speaker 2: I'm applying.
Speaker 1: Them, Because the reference, namely God in this case, is
Speaker 1: completely different because he's absolutely simple, and all of the
Speaker 1: predicates are this are identical.
Speaker 2: Here we are going in circles. Okay, let's see if
Speaker 2: I can try this another one.
Speaker 1: And by the way, it doesn't work either to say
Speaker 1: let's start with creaturely love and then reason up because
Speaker 1: we all know what love is. No, we don't. In fact,
Speaker 1: I would again that's a classical foundationalist assumption from this
Speaker 1: kind of epistemology that we would reject. You don't have
Speaker 1: a clear idea of something like self evident maxims or
Speaker 1: something like this that you can then reason up to
Speaker 1: build up to God. In fact, if there's no way
Speaker 1: to understand those maxims or those foundations epistemologically or logically
Speaker 1: or whatever without presupposing God's existence.
Speaker 2: Well, that's a whole other argument. Do you want to
Speaker 2: keep on going with analogy for a better or should
Speaker 2: we just I'm.
Speaker 1: Gonna have to go. Let's take some super so people
Speaker 1: who are listening, if you want to take if you
Speaker 1: want to ask questions, I'm sure this will take a
Speaker 1: few minutes, but you can ask your super chat questions. Now.
Speaker 1: We already have a couple here, one from Gilaimos Russius
Speaker 1: for five dollar. He says, the Father uncreated, the Son uncreated,
Speaker 1: the Holygos uncreated, not three uncreated, but one uncreated Athenationian creed. Actually,
Speaker 1: even Rome admits that the Athenaian creed was not composed
Speaker 1: by Athenatius. It's a later forgery, and the Orthodox Church
Speaker 1: does not accept the Athnician creed. But yes, we agreed
Speaker 1: that all three of the persons are uncreated. Gillie Mus
Speaker 1: Russius again for five dollars. When the peraclet cometh, whom
Speaker 1: I will send to you from the Father, the spirit
Speaker 1: of truth, who proceeds from the Father, right proceeds from
Speaker 1: the Father, is a statement of our in our view,
Speaker 1: hypostetic origin, and the Father is the sole archae is
Speaker 1: the only source of the Spirit. Jesus says he will
Speaker 1: send the Spirit into time and history. All Orthodox writers
Speaker 1: believe in the mission of the Spirit being sent by Jesus.
Speaker 1: This is why began the debate making the distinction between
Speaker 1: economia or the mission of the Spirit within history, the
Speaker 1: eternal manifestation of the Spirit, which applies the Augustinian psychological
Speaker 1: analogy in Saint Gregor. Almost the Sun eternally manifest the Spirit.
Speaker 1: But then in terms of hypostatic origins, the Father alone
Speaker 1: is the arka soul and cause of the persons in
Speaker 1: our view? Are there any more super chats? If not,
Speaker 1: I think we will call it to a close, give
Speaker 1: them a few minutes. Yeah, man, this was This was
Speaker 1: pretty intense, pretty heated, pretty pretty deep stuff. I appreciate
Speaker 1: doing it, and if we get a few more, appreciate
Speaker 1: the opportunity. Yeah, if we get a few more super chats,
Speaker 1: I'll split the money with you. But I go not
Speaker 1: ending about that. Well, I always do that with guests.
Speaker 1: Any of you, theo nerds out there, won't ask questions,
Speaker 1: send us some money. What we do we do? Two hours?
Speaker 1: A little bit of her Okay, all right, well, I'm
Speaker 1: not seeing any more super chats. So I guess we'll
Speaker 1: call it a close, and thank you doctor fine Gold,
Speaker 1: very eloquent, very good at explicating his positions, good defender
Speaker 1: of Tomism. We will think about this spatimistic heresies, but
Speaker 1: let's do on this for a while and uh we'll
Speaker 1: come back with maybe a part two.
Speaker 2: All right, well, thank you, all right, God bless you.
Speaker 1: Thank you Jack too. Man