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Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
Page 1 of 17
In our day and age, people seem to have a better understanding and knowledge of
material things than they do God. They tend to keep their focus on the things of this world rather
than looking up toward God. For our human eyes and senses it is easy to touch, smell, see and
interact with the physical world and come to know facts about the things we encounter in the
world around us. Our five senses are receptors to physical information of the things we
experience. First, the senses pass the received information via the nervous system to the brain
where we can grasp the concept of what we are experiencing using our intellects. It is easy for us
to see that we can have and obtain knowledge of material things. It is also given that we can
know of things we cannot experience with our senses or have not encountered before in our
lives. Just for example, I can teach something intangible to my best friend, and he would believe
me and hold what I said is true because he trusts me and knows I would not lie to him.
Still, many people say that man cannot know God and also say that God does not exist.
Obviously, they say this on the premise that they themselves do not yet have a relationship with
God and have not yet explored the ways of knowing this Divine Being. Throughout the
centuries many people have written about how man can obtain knowledge of God and experience
His Being, and numerous discourses have been spilled out over the centuries on how man can
know God’s eternal Essence.
Natural Reasoning – St. Thomas Aquinas and the Five Ways
We will now turn to natural reasoning by which man can obtain knowledge of God namely
the Five Ways of God’s existence according to St. Thomas Aquinas. First, In St. Thomas’
“Treatise on God” from part one of his Summa. He explains that Since God is existence the term
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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“God” implies “existence” and so therefore his existence is self-evident.1 St. Thomas Aquinas
says there are two ways in which something can be self-evident: something can be self-evident
but not to us or self-evident and to us. With our human nature, our minds are incapable of
grasping the meaning of such a term as “God” because his existence is not “self-evident” to the
limited knowledge of our minds. God is self-evident, but not to us. However, Aquinas says that
God can be made self-evident to us through these effects which are what St. Thomas talks about
in his Five Ways.2
I. Natural Theology and Natural Reason
Knowledge of God by Knowledge of His Effects – St. Thomas Aquinas He explains that God’s existence can be demonstrated by our reasoning that God is the
cause of the effects which we on earth experience. We will briefly describe the Five Ways that
we can have knowledge of that evidence God’s existence. First, St. Thomas Aquinas speaks
about the fact that there is motion in the world. He says that for something to be in motion it has
to be moved by something else, and so St. Thomas concludes that the effects of motion are
caused by a first mover who is God. Second, by the fact that there are multiple series of agents
(efficient causes) that bring about change or bring things into existence entails that there is a first
cause, a first efficient cause who is God. Something must be pre-existing in order to cause
something else to exist. Thirdly, the truth that there are possible beings (beings that can not-
exist) means there has to be a necessary being, God, who cannot not exist and who has His own
source of necessity. In reality we find kinds of things that can exist or cannot exist. It is possible
that some things can exist and at some point in history did not exist anymore. If it is possible that
1 Donald C. Abel, Fifty Readings in Philosophy, Third Edition, (New York: McGraw-Hill Companies Inc., 2008), 32.
2 From this point definitions about the Five Ways comes from Donald C. Abel, 32-37.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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if there was a point in time that nothing ever existed then the reality would be that nothing could
have ever began to exist. This proves that the idea that at one time nothing existed is completely
false. Therefor there has to be a necessary fact in reality. We cannot regress back beyond the
cause of our existence. Therefore God is the intrinsically necessary being.
Next, in his fourth way, St. Thomas Aquinas writes that by the fact that there are
different kinds of beings with different degrees of perfections implies that there must be a
supreme being who causes these beings to be. The gradations we find in reality such as more or
less, more perfect or less perfect, more good or less good lead us to the knowledge of God who
causes goodness and perfection of qualities. It is logical to see that something exists which
causes other things to exist in more or lesser degrees. So there has to exist something that causes
existence as well as the goodness and perfection of every being, and so following, the cause of
all beings and their gradations is God. There has to be something that is the most perfect, most
excellent, and most true.
Finally In the fifth way, St. Thomas says that we can know God exists because natural
beings without intelligence such as plants act by with growing and reproducing as its goals.
Therefore these actions imply that another being guides non-intelligent things towards their
goals. Things without knowledge such as plants must be directed by an intelligent being who
orders all things of nature and directs their goals to their ends. Things in nature must be traced
back to God as their first cause Who is unchanging and directs unintelligent things.
Since knowledge is caused by demonstration, the invisible things of God become visible
when we understand the things that have been made.3 We come to the knowledge of the cause
3 Ibid., 34.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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through its effect, because the effect is more clearly seen than the cause, but we know that the
existence of the cause is real because the effects are known to us.4 Effects naturally depend on a
cause, and this First Cause is God. We can demonstrate the existence of God by any one of the
effects which have been shown to us in great detail.5
Article 12. Whether God can be known in this life by natural reason? In the First Part of St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica is where St. Thomas speaks
about the knowledge of God and how we can know God. Particularly Question twelve of deals
with this subject and is divided up into thirteen articles.6 In his twelfth article St. Thomas
Aquinas explains that God can be known by natural reason. He says that natural knowledge is
obtained from sensible things and because of their physicality, knowledge can only be obtained
from sensible things to an extent. The human mind cannot see the essence of God from being led
by the senses. St. Thomas clarifies that the sensible effects produced by God are not equivalent
to the entirety of God’s power and therefore God’s essence cannot be seen from experiencing
His sensible effects. Sensible things can however lead man to know God because these effects
have God as their first cause, explains Aquinas.
Fr. Francisco Suárez Having spoken of the natural ways by which man can know God according to St. Thomas
Aquinas let us now turn to the natural theology of Fr. Francisco Suárez. Fr. Francisco Suárez was
a Jesuit Priest from Granada, Spain who lived between the years 1548-1617. In his time he was
very respected by the high intellectuals in universities across Europe and was honored by popes
4 Ibid. 35.
5 Ibid.
6 From this point on, all of the information regarding knowledge of God and His Divine Essence according to
Aquinas can be sourced from: St. Thomas Aquinas, “Summa Theologica,” First Part, Question 12, Articles 1-13. 2nd and Revised Edition. Translated by Fathers of the Dominican Province. Online Edition Copyright by Kevin Knight 2008. At New Advent. http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1012.htm#4. 20 July 2012.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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as well. Pope Paul V named him Doctor eximius et pius (Most exalted and pious teacher).7 He
wrote many theological and philosophical works including his monumental Disputationes
Metaphysicae (Metaphysical Disputations). Fr. Suárez wrote “About God, the First Being and
Uncreated Substance, as He Can by Natural Reason Be Known to Exist” this is primarily found
in the 29th
Disputation of his Disputationes Metaphysicae.8 In the 30
th Disputation he teaches
“On the First Being, Insofar as He Can Be Known Through Natural Reason, His Essence and
Attributes.”9 He explains his views by using pure philosophy, which means that he does not rely
on divine revelation to explain his philosophy to other people. In this work, he wrote in the role
of philosopher instead of theologian. He used natural theology, and like St. Thomas Aquinas, he
believed that the human intellect had a limited capacity to obtain knowledge of God and could
obtain this knowledge through natural reason by observing God’s effects. With St. Thomas
Aquinas, Fr. Francisco Suárez agreed that God’s existence is not self-evident, thus man needs a
metaphysical explanation. In the 29th
Disputation Fr. Suárez demonstrates the existence of God
as the first Cause, the Uncreated Being.
He said that a metaphysical explanation is the proper way to approach the subject of
God’s existence as opposed to natural philosophy. He says that natural philosophical arguments
for God fail to prove His existence or are forced to rely on metaphysical principles. Thus in his
argument for God, Fr. Suárez says that his first premise (P1) “Everything that is moved is moved
by another” comes from natural philosophy while his second premise (P2) “Everything that is
produced is produced by another” which comes from metaphysics, is necessary.10
He says this is
7 Bernie Cantens, "Francisco Suárez." The History of Western Philosophy of Religion ,Volume 3 Early Modern
Philosophy. Edited by Graham Oppy and Nick Trakakis. Durham: Acumen Publishing Limited, 2009, 75-87. 8 Ibid., 76.
9 Ibid., 76.
10 Ibid., 77.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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so because in P1, things can be moved by non-material things such as actions moved by a
person’s will.11
This is why he believed that to explain the existence of God, a metaphysical
approach was more appropriate than on by natural philosophy. Furthermore, he explains that P2
is more important because from it comes the conclusion that a thing can only be produced from
something else. Nothing can come from nothing. There are three possible ways held that
something can come into being: from another thing, from itself, or finally from nothing. The
final two ways are impossible because “something cannot come from nothing” and the second is
also false because prior to producing something from itself, itself had to come from. Therefore,
there has to be an eternal first cause which is the Uncreated Being. This is the Ultimate Reality
which every object in the universe points to.
Like St. Thomas Aquinas, Fr. Francisco Suárez says natural reason alone is not sufficient
for the created intellect to come to know the essence of God for it is impossible to have a priori
knowledge of God’s essence or attributes because the knowledge that we have of God comes by
way of His effects.12
When we do obtain knowledge of God’s attributes it is possible for man to
obtain knowledge of other attributes of God. In this way, the intellect derives knowledge of God
from other a priori concepts he has obtained so that the knowledge process is a sort of
consequential chain of events stemming from the first piece of knowledge obtained through
God’s effects.13
Fr. Suárez wrote that the first attribute we can know is that God is a necessary uncreated
being as per his argument for the existence for God which we just discussed, and we can also
11
Ibid. 12
Ibid., 83. 13
Ibid.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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know “that God is His own being through His essence.”14
Thus Fr. Suárez writes that the first
attribute we can know about God is that His “existence is identical to His essence,” and from this
attribute, Fr. Suárez derives other attributes about God such as “God is perfect, is infinite, is pure
act and absolute simplicity, is omnipresent, He lacks substantial and accidental composition, and
God is immutable, invisible, incomprehensible, and eternal to name a few.15
Also in the 30th
Disputation Fr. Suárez speaks about whether human intellects can
comprehend God. Similar to St. Thomas Aquinas, he writes that to human perception and to
natural intellects, God is invisible. His essence is invisible.16
Thus by our natural powers of our
intellects we cannot grasp the Divine Essence and so we cannot comprehend God; however, we
can still know many things about God’s attributes.17
[ Next Slide] Another attribute of God that Fr. Suárez wrote about is that God is ineffable
in the sense that His Divine Being cannot be properly spoken of. His perfection renders it
impossible to explain in words His Divine Essence.18
Because God has the attributes of
invisibility and incomprehensibility, it follows that God also is ineffable, and since names are
given as signs of concepts then we cannot name or illustrate God’s perfection with words.19
This
same acknowledgment of God’s ineffability is captured in the very first paragraph of Blessed
John Duns Scotus’ work titled A Treatise on God as First Principle. Here he says,
“O Lord our God, true teacher that you are, when Moses your servant asked you
for your name that he might proclaim it to the children of Israel, you, knowing
what the mind of mortals could grasp of you, replied: "I am who am," thus
14
Ibid. 15
Ibid. 16
Ibid., 86. 17
Ibid. 18
Ibid. 19
Ibid.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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disclosing your blessed name. You are truly what it means to be, you are the
whole of what it means to exist.”20
II. Knowledge of God through the Intellect How created intellects can have knowledge of the Increateable God
In his Summa, St. Thomas Aquinas counters the argument that man cannot know God
because he is beyond knowing since he is eternal. People who hold this argument state that
knowledge is only proportional to the knower, and therefore we could never know God because
He is beyond our understanding. Indeed, God is beyond our understanding. How could we ever
know God completely prior to the Beatific Vision of Him in Heaven? We cannot see Him in His
full glory. Truly, we would be knocked dead at first sight of Him were He to appear on earth as
He is in Heaven before our very eyes. Still, the human intellect can know God. Then how can
the created intellect see the essence of God? St. Thomas points to the nature of God to explain
this objection. He says that since actual things are knowable, then God, whose nature is pure
actuality, is therefore completely knowable to us. Due to His eternal nature, God is without
potentiality and is pure act. God has no beginning and no end. He is without cause. Pure act is
knowable by man.
Blessed John Duns Scotus (1266 A.D. - 1308 A. D.) This leads us briefly to the epistemology of Blessed John Duns Scotus who lived between
the years 1266 A.D. and 1308 A. D. He also spoke about the Being of God. In agreement with
St. Thomas Aquinas, he believed that God exists in a different mode of being than do humans. It
is true that I exist and God exists, but obviously God exists in a very different way than I do
because he has existed for an eternity before me. He also existed before the time when He
20
Blessed John Duns Scotus, “A Treatise on God as First Principle.” Eternal Word Television Network online document library. http://www.ewtn.com/library/THEOLOGY/GODASFIR.HTM. Accessed 11 August 2012.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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infused a soul into the first human being on earth, and breathed life into his nostrils. God exists
in a different mode of being than do you and I. The pure actuality of God is knowable by us.
The difference between our being and God’s Being is that the soul of God has been
actualized from all eternity. His Being, the Godhead Three in One, has existed from all eternity
in actual Being. Our souls, our beings, have been known from all eternity by the Most High, but
they are not actualized into physical human beings until the moment we were conceived in each
of our mothers’ wombs. That is the moment when we came into existence and had actual being.
While we are talking about Bl. John Duns Scotus’ thoughts on God, let’s enter into his
philosophy of how man can know both God and things in the physical world. The proper object
of the human intellect, the object to which our minds are naturally capable to understand, has
been assigned to different objects by different philosophers. Henry of Ghent said the proper
object of the intellect was God, while St. Thomas Aquinas said it was the material world which
our intellects are natural suited to understand. On the other hand, Bl. John Duns Scotus said it
could be neither of these object. He said God could not be the proper object because the human
person could never contain the magnificent Being of God in his intellect. Further Bl. John Scotus
said that because the material world does not contain all that the human intellect seeks to know,
things in the material world could not be the primary objects. The essence of material things also
could not be the primary object because human beings seek to know the cause of these things.
Humans seek to know the ultimate causes of things, and therefore our intellects have the capacity
to acquire knowledge of immaterial things. We have the ability to study things that are spiritual
and physical so the one univocal concept which is found in God and in the material world is
being itself. Thus Bl. John Scotus said that being was the proper object of the human intellect. It
is clear to see that being is a property of everything that is intelligible to us, thus non-being is
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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incomprehensible. With being as our primary object we can grasp both God and material objects
since both God and material objects have being.
However, we can only grasp the being of God that we are capable of receiving in our
intellect. We could not contain His whole being. Some people say that Bl. John Duns Scotus’
teaching of univocity of being leads to pantheism, but this is not true. Those who jump to this
conclusion have failed to take into account the nature of God’s Being and see the difference
between His Being and ours. Remember earlier we discussed that God’s Being is eternal without
beginning and ours is not. His being has been actualized from all eternity, while our beings were
only actualized at conception. Therefore the teaching of Blessed John Duns Scotus does not
place humans on the same plane as God. Going back to St. Thomas Aquinas’ reply to how the
created intellect can know God we have seen that as actual things are knowable, then God, who
is pure actuality, is therefore knowable to us.
St. Thomas Aquinas also points out that some people will also say that God cannot be
comprehended because he is super-existence and therefore has no being. It is true, His existence
is completely different than ours, but some have said that He has no existence because he is over
all things. To further their claim that man cannot know God they say human intellects can only
know existing things. St. Thomas Aquinas refutes this argument by saying “God is His own
existence” thus He has existence, and thus man can know God because God exists in actuality.
St. Thomas Aquinas says that it makes no sense that God cannot be comprehended by any
means.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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III. Knowledge of God’s Divine Essence Now that we have discussed the fundamental ways in which God can be known through
the senses we will now turn our focus more towards how the natural human intellect can obtain
knowledge of God and if we can come to know his Divine Essence.
Article 3. Whether the essence of God can be seen with the bodily eye? St. Thomas
Aquinas says that we cannot see God by any of our five senses or imagination, but only by our
intellect which is incorporeal as God’s essence. He further says that the imagination is driven by
the senses and therefore one cannot have an image of God in their imagination. The act must be
proportionate to its nature it belongs to, and since imagination receives its input from the five
senses, then we cannot have a vision of imagination of God. Imagination is a faculty of sensitive
powers while the intellect is a faculty of thought which is not corporeal. Only the intellect can
see God.
On how created intellects can see God But how can the created intellect see God? St. Thomas Aquinas continues. Our intellects
which are created by God have the capability to see their Creator though not by their own natural
ability. Because we are bridging the gap between the corporeal world and the spiritual we need
to be assisted by divine grace to see God’s Essence. First let’s discuss the cognitive powers of
the soul. St. Thomas Aquinas taught that our souls have two cognitive powers. One power is by
way of a corporeal organ through which we sense things physically. The second is the intellect
which extracts the nature from a thing. Natural intellects like ours are naturally suited to know
natural things, not those with self-subsistent beings. God alone has a self-subsistent Being, and
only a knower with a subsistent nature like an Angel could know and see God’s essence.
Therefore, our natures which have being in matter, need divine grace from God for our intellects
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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to be able to see the His Essence. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, “Therefore the created intellect
cannot see the essence of God, unless God by His grace unites Himself to the created intellect, as
an object made intelligible to it.”21
St. Thomas Aquinas describes the two necessary things for sensible and intellectual
vision. In both cases for sight, it is necessary to have the power of sight and the “union of the
thing seen with the sight.”22
The similitude of the object is in the eye of the beholder, not the
object itself. This union of the similitude of the object with sight makes the vision real. Well if
nothing can be produced having the similitude of the essence of God for us to grasp, then what
will take the place of His similitude? What could possibly be the similitude of which still retains
an Image of the Essence of God which unites our vision, our intellective vision to the Being of
God Himself…? [Next Slide] As St. Thomas Aquinas says, the only thing possible is the “light
of glory”, Divine Grace from God. For the natural powers of our intellect do not make us capable
of seeing the Divine Essence and no created thing can be a substitute for the similitude of God’s
essence, thus the similitude of God is the Divine light of Glory.
We have established that the human intellect has the faculty of seeing God because it has
the capacity to see its Maker and has the capacity to see God by way of seeing the Divine
similitude, the light of glory. However, the created intellect cannot fully comprehend God. St.
Thomas Aquinas says, “Everything is knowable according to its actuality.”23
Therefore God is
infinitely knowable, because His actuality is infinite, but how can man’s created intellect know
the essence of God whose actuality is infinite? Simply put, we cannot because as St. Thomas
says, the created intellect cannot receive an infinite amount of the light of glory because the
21
Aquinas, Article 2. 22
Ibid. 23
Ibid., Article8
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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created intellect cannot contain that amount and so man cannot fully comprehend God, but we
can still come to know parts of His essence.
Article 5: Whether the created intellect needs any created light in order
to see the Essence of God?
St. Thomas Aquinas says that for man to see the essence of God, he needs assistance. When the
human intellect sees the essence of God, God’s essence logically “becomes the intelligible form
of the intellect,” but for this to happen the human intellect must be prepared by divine operation.
St. Thomas says that man’s intellect needs a created light. He makes it clear that this created
light is not “a medium in which God is seen, but as one by which He is seen.” The use of the
word ‘by’ signifies that this light assists us in seeing God’s Essence. It empowers the human
intellect to receive the light of glory, that divine similitude of God. By its own nature the human
intellect cannot see the Essence of God, and so it must be assisted. St. Thomas says that for
something to be raised up past its nature, it must be prepared by something beyond its nature.
Thus he says that the intellect must be illuminated. He calls this illumination of the intellect, the
“power of understanding” which is added to the intellect. This created light called the power of
understanding further sets us apart from animals and creatures. By this light imparted to human
intellect, we are made deiform, that is to say, in the Image and Likeness of God.
IV. Revelation, Grace, and Infused Knowledge Apart from knowledge gained through natural reasoning, philosophers have spoken of
knowledge that is supernaturally granted to man via divine illumination. This has been called
infused knowledge. Infused knowledge is not acquired by any personal effort or from other
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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men, but is acquired through direct illumination of the mind by a divine source.24
God can speak
internally or could act directly on a person’s mind.25
Still an inner illumination of the intellect
would have to take place so that the person would know that God Himself was acting.
Article 11. Whether anyone in this life can see the essence of God?
In Article 11 St. Thomas Aquinas responds to the objection that humans are able to
directly see God’s Essence. He says that only when man is separated form earthly life will he be
able to see God’s Essence. Not on this earth is man capable of seeing the Divine Essence
because as St. Thomas established in Article Four, “the mode of knowledge follows the mode of
the nature of the knower.” In this life, says Aquinas, our soul has its being within bodily matter
and so the Divine Essence cannot be seen through material nature. The created similitude that
man is capable of seeing is not a vision of God’s Essence. St. Thomas Aquinas makes a point
that is important in our spiritual life: “The more our soul is abstracted from corporeal things, the
more it is capable of receiving abstract intelligible things” (Question 12, Article 11). As a result
of being less attached to this world, he says that “in dreams and alienations of the bodily senses,
divine revelations and foresight of future events are perceived more clearly;” however, human
intellects still cannot see God’s true Essence because human persons see and experience things
through a physical lens.
One may object and say that since we see things in God’s light and judge things
according to divine truth, then man is able to see God because he has communicated with the
Divine. On the contrary, St. Thomas Aquinas says that when we judge things with natural
reason we do not see the essence of God. This is unnecessary. For example he says a quote by
24
A. B. Wolter ,"Knowledge, Infused," New Catholic Encyclopedia. 2nd ed. Vol. 8. Detroit: Gale, 2003. 207-208. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 21 July 2012. 25
Ibid.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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St. Augustine that it is unnecessary to see the sun in order to see an intelligible object under the
sun. We do not need to see the source as it is to see its effects.
Article 13. Whether by grace a higher knowledge of God can be obtained than by
natural reason?
In Article 13 St. Thomas Aquinas answers the question, by what other means can man
obtain a higher knowledge of God than through natural reason. He answers that by grace the
human intellect can obtain a higher level of knowledge. To explain this St. Thomas Aquinas
gives characteristics of the knowledge humans obtain through natural reason. This type of
knowledge is characterized by two aspects: images that we derive from objects we experience
with our senses and it is also characterized by natural intelligible light which gives us the ability
to draw intelligible conceptions from them. In both characteristics, the natural light of the
intellect is augmented by an infusion of grace also called gratuitous light into the human intellect
in order to gain a higher knowledge of God.
St. Thomas Aquinas also says that this grace by divine operation may sometimes form
images in the imagination which would otherwise not be formed had it not been for the infusion
of grace. God grants this grace in order to divinely express things to us better than were we to
receive these concepts from sensible objects. God in His revelation of grace to man’s intellect is
not limited to divinely forming visions or voices or other things which we can perceive with our
senses when our intellects are fortified by divine light. Furthermore St. Thomas Aquinas says
that the stronger the intelligible light is in the intellect, the more excellent knowledge we have
and when divine light is infused an even greater knowledge is obtained.
To summarize facts we have discussed involving how man can obtain knowledge of God
let us begin by saying that yes man can obtain knowledge of God. He is able to grasp both
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
Dr. Philippe Yates Holy Apostles Seminary
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material things and God because they both have being which Blessed John Duns Scotus says is
the proper object of the human intellect because it is a univocal concept. However, because of
our human intellects we cannot fully comprehend God’s Divine Essence, because the nature of
our intellects is not infinite like the Being of God is. We can understand and obtain knowledge of
God through experiencing his effects on earth as we discussed in St. Thomas Aquinas’ Five
Ways. Through these teachings and others which we discussed including Fr. Francisco Suárez,
we have shown that God is the Ultimate Reality, the Eternal Uncreated Being. Neither by sense
nor by our intellects, can we see the Divine Essence of God as it fully is. In order to see
something there has to be a union of our vision with an object. Though we cannot see God, we
can see His similitude, which is a likeness of his Divine Image in the form of the light of glory.
Through revelation grace, and infused knowledge, God can strengthen our human intellects in
order to raise our knowledge of him to a higher degree only possible through a divine operation,
but still accessible to our intellects and senses.
Epistemology Final Report – Cognitio Dei – Knowledge of God Jonathan Davis
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Works Cited
Abel, Donald C. Fifty Readings in Philosophy. New York: McGraw-Hill Companies Inc, 2008.
Aquinas, St. Thomas. “Summa Theologica” First Part, Question 12, Articles 1-13. 2nd
and
Revised Edition. Tranlated by Fathers of the Dominican Province. Online Edition
Copyright byKevin Knight 2008. At New Advent.
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1012.htm#4. 20 July 2012.
Cantens, Bernie. "Francisco Suárez." The History of Western Philosophy of Religion. Volume 3
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