Divine Freedom and the Structure of the Summa theologiae

Thomas Aquinas transitions from the Prima pars to the Secunda pars with a reference to John Damascene and to humans as created in the “image of God” (ad imaginem Dei). Aquinas’s prologue to the Secunda pars (P-II) states:

Because, as Damascene states, man is said to be made to the image of God, insofar as through image is signified [a being] intellectual and free in judgement [arbitrio liberum] and powerful in itself; after what has been said before about the exemplar, i.e., God, and about those things which proceeded from divine power according to his will; it remains that we ought to consider his image, i.e., man, insofar as he is also the principle of his works, as [quasi] having freedom in decision and power of his works.¹

An “image” (imaginem) signifies an intellectual being who is “free in judgment” (arbitrio liberum) with its own proper power (per se potestativum). This reference to man as imago Dei serves as the entry point for Aquinas’s explanation of the integration of the Secunda pars with the Prima pars. He characterizes the Prima pars as an examination of God, the “exemplar” (de exemplari) of man as imago, and of “those things which proceeded from the divine power according to his will.” Materially considered, these elements correspond to what Aquinas outlined in the prologue to STh I, q. 2: “the intention of this sacra doctrina is to pass on the knowledge of God” which includes (but is not limited to) the knowledge of God “as he is in himself.” He then reveals that his plan of exposition will consist of three parts—the first of which is a de Deo discourse. Finally, in the prologue to STh I, q. 2, Aquinas further delineates his de Deo consideration into three subparts: the divine essence, the distinction of Trinitarian Persons, and the procession of creatures from God.

We note with interest the elements of the prologue to STh I, q. 2 (and of the Prima pars) that Aquinas highlights in P-II as especially germane to the plan of the Summa theologiae. In P-II he does not explicitly mention the divine essence or the Trinity of Divine Persons. Rather he assumes both when he references that which came before as “de Deo.” Moreover, he summarizes the de Deo parts under the formality of exemplarity (praedictum est de exemplari). The text highlights the imago-exemplarity of God in relation to “those things which proceed from divine power according to his will.” (Hence, exemplarity is present in each question that follows STh I, q. 44.)

The formality of exemplarity serves as the unifying link of transition from the Prima pars to the Secunda pars. The continuity between them lies in this formality. In and of himself, of course, God (the divine essence and the Trinity of Persons) is self-sufficient. In light of what Aquinas explains in the Prima pars, it is evident that there is neither potency nor privation present in God.² Neither need nor change find any real intelligibility in he who is esse ipsum per se subsistens. If Aquinas were compelled to consider exclusively God “as he is in himself,” the Prima pars’s questions about the divine essence and the Holy Trinity would (formally) suffice. The self-sufficient necessity found in the order of divine being (per se) equates with self-sufficiency in order of divine knowing.³ And this divine self-sufficiency—in the order of being and in the order of knowing—would likewise apply to the contingent creature’s limited participation in the cognitio Dei. An absolutely exclusive and proper divine formality would bring the Summa theologiae to a literary close with the final lines of the Prima pars section on the mission of the Divine Persons (STh I, q. 43).

Admittedly, further material additions to the de Deo treatise would be infinitely possible. The act of contingent contemplation always includes room for further augmentation and material addition—especially when a contingent intellect considers a formally infinite being under the aspect of the being’s essential infinity. With little difficulty, we could conceive the formal limits and specifications of the Prima pars remaining consistently and objectively precise even as its number of questions, articles, and arguments endlessly increased. Because of the restrictions proper to the nature of a contingent intellect, an infinitely simple object of contemplation can only be reached according to a non-simple modality through discrete acts of discursive reasoning in the light of faith.⁴ Contingent intellects know all beings—infinite being included—according to the natural modalities that their contingent limitations necessitate. “Those things that are simple according to themselves, the [human] intellect knows according to a certain kind of complexity.”⁵ Of course, the lumen gloriae received by the blessed in beatific act introduces a new cognitive formality and objectivity to the potency of human cognition.⁶ We are speaking, thus, of the Summa theologiae as a work of a theologian in via for his fellow wayfarers also in via. Nonetheless, the point remains: the ontological and epistemological self-sufficiency of the infinite and simple God—considered under the formality of Deus in se—would seem to render the first two parts of the Prima pars sufficient.

Hence, we can identify the following alignment in the progression of the Summa theologiae: the procession of creatures from God (as explored in the Prima pars questions 44–119) serves as the transitional link between (1) the de Deo consideration in the Prima pars to (2) the moral matters in the Secunda pars. God’s free creative act presented in the third part of the Prima pars (which Aquinas summarily attributes, in P-II, to the “divine power according to his will”) accounts for the existence of the Secunda pars. The divine freedom that established contingent being in existence informs the fittingness of a study of contingent freedom (vis-à-vis the divine being). Moreover, God freely creates from his exemplary wisdom through the free command of his divine will. As his images, human persons not only receive their very existence from this exemplary wisdom and through the command of his will, but they also bear themselves active potencies of intellection and volition.

In and of itself, a legitimate consideration of theology’s subject (i.e., God) would not require a transition from the de Deo exposition outlined in the prologue to STh I, q. 2. This statement is made in reference to what is necessary and proper to God as he is (per se) and as he is the object of study (quoad nos). Although counterfactual, it is conceivable that the Prima pars could omit its third part (which treats the procession of creatures from God). Such an omission would not constitute a transgression of scientific strictures. The ontological non-necessity of God’s creative work corresponds to a scientific (disciplinary) non-necessity of the Secunda pars in the Summa theologiae. In other words, the Secunda pars follows upon the divine freedom to create—both in the order of being and (consequently) in the order of scientia. (Of course, this point does not deny that, following God’s creative work, there are scientific principles within the created and continent order.)

The de facto inclusion of the Secunda pars and the Tertia pars in the Summa theologiae proceeds from (1) the free decision of God to create (as principle of creatures), and (2) his derivative identity as the end of that which he creates. We contrast (1) this absolute scientific non-necessity with (2) the de facto scientific inclusion of the Secunda pars and the Tertia pars in the Summa theologiae in order to highlight the ordo disciplinae range of theological wisdom enlarged through the creative freedom of God. The free decision of God to create serves as the foundation for (1) the existence of the contingent created order, (2) God’s identity as the principle of this contingent created order, and (3) God’s identity as the end of this contingent created order. The subjects that enjoy inclusion in a properly scientific sacra doctrina discourse (i.e., the creature’s procession from God, the creature’s return to God, and Christ as via in Deum) are all relevant to the sacra doctrina because of God’s free decision to create and to redeem. Therefore, divine freedom stands as the critical principle in the Summa theologiae’s progression from the Prima pars, through the Secunda pars, to the Tertia pars. Moreover, the Prima pars’ consideration of God “not only insofar as he is in himself, but also as he is the principle of things” anticipates the materials covered in the Secunda pars and the Tertia pars. These observations all serve our appreciation of the Summa theologiae’s integrated unity throughout its three parts. The study of divine freedom in creation (Prima pars) leads to the study of contingent freedom (Secunda pars), which leads to the study of the redemption of created freedom by the divine freedom (Tertia pars).⁷

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1. “Quia, sicut Damascenus dicit [De Fide Orth. ii, 12], homo factus ad imaginem Dei dicitur, secundum quod per imaginem significatur intellectuale et arbitrio liberum et per se potestativum; postquam praedictum est de exemplari, scilicet de Deo, et de his quae processerunt ex divina potestate secundum eius voluntatem; restat ut consideremus de eius imagine, idest de homine, secundum quod et ipse est suorum operum principium, quasi liberum arbitrium habens et suorum operum potestatem.” For a study of P-II in relation to the Secunda pars in general and STh I-II, q. 1, aa. 1–8 in particular, see Ignatius Theodore Eschmann, O.P., “Saint Thomas Aquinas O.P., the Summary of Theology I-II: Prologue and Question 1, Articles 1-8,” in The Ethics of Saint Thomas Aquinas: Two Courses, ed. Edward A. Synan (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1997), 3–153.↩︎

2. All of articles in STh I, q. 3 advert to the absence of potency in God. For recent considerations of God’s actus purus simplicity and the absence of any potentiality or privation in God, see Juan José Herrera, La simplicidad divina según santo Tomás de Aquino (San Miguel de Tucumán: Ediciones de la Universidad del Norte Santo Tomás de Aquino, 2011); Serge-Thomas Bonino, O.P., Dieu, « Celui qui est » (De Deo ut uno) (Paris: Parole et Silence, 2016), 229–96.↩︎

3. STh I, q. 14, a. 4.↩︎

4. This statement, of course, refers to something akin to the “acquired” or to the “theological contemplation” of the theologian rather than to the so-called “infused contemplation” of the saint. Infused contemplation proceeds according to a supernatural modality. Acquired contemplation remains within the structural bounds of human ratiocination(STh II-II, q. 180, a. 4). Because infused contemplation cannot be taught—it is a divine gift liberally originating from the divine largess—our analysis only applies to acquired contemplation because this latter form of contemplation is the only form that Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae could aspire to facilitate. See Gilles Emery, O.P., “The Purpose of Trinitarian Theology in St. Thomas Aquinas,” in Trinity, Church, and the Human Person: Thomistic Essays (Naples, FL: Sapientia Press, 2007), 1–32 at 30. For recent studies of contemplation in Aquinas’s writings, see Adriano Oliva, “La contemplation des philosophes selon Thomas d’Aquin,” Revue des Sciences Philosophiques et Théologiques 96, no. 4 (2012): 585–662; Mary Catherine Sommers, “Contemplation and Action in Aristotle and Aquinas,” in Aristotle in Aquinas’s Theology, ed. Gilles Emery, O.P., and Matthew Levering (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 167–85; Rik van Nieuwenhove, “Aquinas on Contemplation: A Neglected Topic,” in Jaarboek 2016: Thomas Instituut te Utrecht – Jaargang 35, ed. Henk J. M. Schoot (Herent: Thomas Instituut te Utrecht, 2016), 9–33; Rik van Nieuwenhove, Thomas Aquinas and Contemplation (Oxford: oxford University Press, 2021).↩︎

5. STh II-II, q. 1, a. 2. See also STh I, q. 88, a. 3, ad 3.↩︎

6. STh I, q. 12, a. 6.↩︎

7. See Rudi te Velde, Aquinas on God: The “Divine Science” of the Summa Theologiae (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2006), 16–17.↩︎