SEVENTH ARTICLE: WHETHER THE ANGELS DIFFER IN SPECIES QUESTION 50, A. 4

The Church has defined nothing on this point, but from the various names used in Sacred Scripture it appears that there is a hierarchy of angels, for example, "Whether thrones or dominations or principalities or powers,"[1200] and in the Old Testament the angels are distinguished and subordinated into seraphim, cherubim, angels, and archangels. From this it is certain that the angels are not different only in number, which theologians commonly admit.

St. Thomas holds that all the angels differ in species; this is denied by Scotus. In agreement with St. Thomas, the Thomists generally admit that there cannot be two angels of the same species. The reason is that those things that are of the same species and differ in number are the same in form and different with regard to matter, since an act is not multiplied except by the potency in which it is received. Thus two perfectly similar drops of water are two by reason of the matter in which their specific forms are received. But the angels are not composed of matter and form. Therefore it is impossible that there be two angels of the same species. That is to say, according to many Thomists, that this is intrinsically impossible, or intrinsically repugnant, and not only extrinsically by reason of the end, as, for example, the annihilation of some blessed soul, which never happens but is still not intrinsically repugnant.

Confirmation. If whiteness were separated from matter, it would be unique. By a similar argument the unicity and infinity of God are apodictically proved, namely, because God, who is pure act, is not received in matter, or unreceived subsistent being.[1201]

In the question, "Concerning spiritual creatures" (a. 8), St. Thomas says: "If the angel is a simple form apart from matter, it is impossible to imagine that there are many angels in the same species." In another place he says: "We cannot understand that any separated form is anything but one of one species."[1202] He also shows that the separated human soul is individuated by the transcendental relation to its body, which will rise again, while the substance of the angel has no relation to a body which it is to inform.[1203] Hence there cannot be two angels of the same species. It is not enough to have recourse to the thisness (haecceitas) of the angel, as Scotus did, for the question arises, whence does it come that in the same species one nature is this as distinct from that. This difference can come only from matter.

The principle of numerical multiplication within the same species must be intrinsic and substantial. But Scotus implies that this can happen without matter marked by quantity or without a relation to such matter. Therefore in the angels, in which there is no matter, there can be no numerical multiplication. Nor can this multiplication be explained by some supernatural addition, since this would be extrinsic to the substance of the angel, which is supposed to be already constituted.

If God were to annihilate the archangel Michael and then create him again, he would be the same Michael with the same essence, the same existence once more produced and received in the same essence. Moreover, even if it were possible to have two angels of the same species successively (by annihilation and a second creation), it would not follow that there were two angels of the same species at the same time. The principle remains that an act cannot be multiplied except by the potency in which it is received.

According to St. Thomas, all angels differ in species according to the different grades of intellectual nature, according to intellectual power, and sometimes, like the birds, the angels have a stronger or weaker visual power. In the same way the seven colors of the rainbow and the seven notes in the scale are distinguished.