THIRD ARTICLE: WHETHER THE NOTIONAL ACTS ARE UNDERSTOOD PRIOR TO THE PROPERTIES

St. Thomas disagrees with the opinion of Alexander of Hales, attributed to St. Bonaventure, according to which the notional acts, for example, generation, constitute the persons in such a way that active generation is antecedent to paternity according to our method of conception.

Reply. In St. Thomas' view the notional acts taken actively, such as to generate and to spirate, presuppose the persons from which they proceed as already constituted, and the persons are constituted by the subsisting relations, as was said above. Hence active generation, or enunciation, proceeds from the divine intellect as modified by the relation of paternity. And yet these notional acts are the bases of the relations inasmuch as the relations actually have a reference to their termini. In our method of conceiving these things the matter is rather obscure with regard to the active origins; this obscurity, however, does not arise with regard to the passive origins since a passive origin, such as passive generation, according to our method of conception precedes the filiation for which it is a basis.

Toward the end of the body of the article St. Thomas replies that a relation (for example, paternity) as a relation actually referring to the Son presupposes active generation; but active generation presupposes the person who generates and the personal property, paternity, as constituting the person. Here there is indeed a mystery but no contradiction. Similarly, in an equilateral triangle the first angle constructed, while it is alone, is a geometric figure but it does not yet refer to the other two angles not yet constructed.

The reader is referred to the article in the Summa.

In question 27 we have examined the difficulty presented by the Latin theory with regard to the proximate principle quo of the divine processions. We concluded that this principle is the divine intellect and will, not in themselves, but as they are modified by the relations of paternity and active spiration.[552]

Nevertheless the relation of paternity as actually and actively terminated in the Son presupposes active generation. In this most difficult expression of the mystery we find something similar to the principle that causes are mutually causes of each other but in different genera. By reason of this principle, for example, the ultimate disposition for a form precedes the form in the order of material cause and afterward follows the form as a property in the order of formal cause. If we have difficulty in expressing this mutual relationship between the material and formal disposition of corporeal beings, it is not surprising that we should find it difficult to express the mutual relationships between the divine relations, such as paternity, and the notional acts, such as active generation.

Generation presupposes the Father and is the foundation for paternity, but not under the same aspect. The matter is somewhat similar to the form which presupposes the disposition and also affords the basis for the disposition inasmuch as the disposition is also a property. An example is the ultimate disposition for the rational soul, whatever it may be, whether it is a movement of the heart or something similar. When this property is destroyed by death, the soul separates from the body, because this property is seen under two aspects at the same time: it is a property and a disposition for the production and conservation of the form in the matter. If this is a mystery in the order of sensible things, we do not wonder that it is difficult to express how these things are in God.

First corollary. As stated in the reply to the first difficulty, both these statements are true: because He generates He is the Father, and because He is the Father He generates. In the first statement the name "Father" is taken as designating the relation alone, or the simple reference to the terminus; in the second statement the name "Father" is taken as designating a subsisting person.

Second corollary. The relation of active spiration, since it does not constitute a person but is merely a reference to a terminus, is posterior in our minds to the notional act of spiration, which is attributed to the Father and the Son.