Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

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Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

Post by Kurieuo »

This is directed at Jac who is perhaps our residential Divine Simplicity specialist. ;)
But also an interesting theological topic I think, and so want to open the floor to anyone who might be interested.

The general lay Christian belief is to conceive of God as some super spiritual being.
God as being composed of some "spiritual substance" as such.
It was my own position up until relatively recently to view God as some divine spiritual substance possessing this and that property (i.e., divine attributes like goodness, holiness, righteousness, lovingness, omniscience, omnipresence, etc).
Now, in light of some interesting logic behind Divine Simplicity, I'm currently in a position of true agnosticism. I just don't know. I have an openness either way to still conservative substance-based views of God (like William Lane Craig) and traditional theological views of God (like Ed Feser, Jac and any other Divine Simplicitians).

In any case, Scripture seems to affirm over and over that God is indeed spirit. (e.g., John 4:24)
And then, there is the Holy Spirit who is God. So I think it is quite difficult for Christians to affirm God isn't really a spirit - THE Spirit.

But then, this will quickly contradict Divine Simplicity thinking.
Because in DS thinking God is not composed of any substance and not made up of this or that part.

So then, a Christian who believes in DS either:
  • (1) needs to re-define "spirit" to mean something other than we generally understand it to mean (that is, some ethereal substance), or
    (2) DS theology isn't fully compatible according to what has been revealed of God's nature in Scripture.
Jac or anyone with an interest care to chime in?
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Re: Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

Post by Jac3510 »

I would opt for your first alternative. It seems like your question assumes a view of spiritual substances that I don't hold in which they (spiritual substances) are considered to be composed of both matter and form, where the "matter" of souls and angels (for instance) is some special kind of immaterial-matter. It's an old and respectable view. I wonder sometimes if it isn't the type of substance dualism Moreland has in mind, and certainly is, or at least was, widespread among even many Catholic philosophers (especially Franciscans, I believe--it had its origins in Avicebron (1021-1058)).

In any case, so the important thing for me is that when we apply the word "substance" to immaterial things--souls (vegetative, animal, or rational), angels, or God--we do not mean to say that there is a material component to them in any sense. To quote Aquinas, "The word substance signifies not only what exists of itself . . . but, it also signifies an essence that has the property of existing in this way--namely, of existing of itself; this existence, however, is not its essence." So humans are substances in that we exist in ourselves, whereas whiteness is not a substance--it is an accident--insofar as it only exists in substances. And human souls are substances in that they exist in themselves, whereas anger is not a substance--it is an accident--insofar as it only exist in substances. But the confusion comes in assuming that because human substances have a material part that therefore the substance of the human soul must have some kind of material component--a spiritual matter, if you will. But as you can see from Aquinas' comment, that assumption is unnecessary and I think wrong. Because "substance" applies to spiritual things not only in the sense that they exist in themselves, but most especially in the sense that the human soul just is the essence of humanity. That is, there is a real sense in which the words "essence" and "substance" are synonymous, and the extended meaning of "substance" that applies to humans or plants only applies because the word's relation to "essence."

If all that is true, then we are wrong to understand "spirit" as some sort of "thing." Spirits are substances, but in the sense that they refer are essences. That is why Aquinas says that because angels do not have a material component part--they are pure form, pure essence--the only way to distinguish between this angel and that angels is at the level of nature or essence or form. And that means that, strictly speaking, there is no genus called "angels" that all angels fall under, and that there are not, strictly speaking, millions of angels. Rather, every single thing we collectively call an "angel" is a distinct, unique, sui generis individual, of which no other kind does or even could exist. So neither angels nor souls are ""spirits" in the sense I'm picking up on in your post.

So apply that to God, He is a "substance" in the sense that His essence is existence itself. His essence is not granted existence as is the case for angels and souls. More technically, the angels form/essence/substance is in potentiality to existence, and it receives the act of existence from God. But God's essence is not in potentiality to existence. His essence is existence. Therefore, if there is no spiritual matter in human souls or angels, then even less is it the case that in God there is some sort of spiritual substance.

Bottom line: "spirit" does not suggest the existence of some sort of ethereal "spiritual matter" out of which it is composed. Rather, spirits are simply the form/animating principle of this or that being, be it composite or otherwise.

As an aside, it may help to note that even the human soul is simple in some important respects--not as radically simple as God, but simple in exactly the sense I've described here: not composed of form and some spiritual matter!
Proinsias wrote:I don't think you are hearing me. Preference for ice cream is a moral issue
And that, brothers and sisters, is the kind of foolishness you get people who insist on denying biblical theism. A good illustration of any as the length people will go to avoid acknowledging basic truths.
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Re: Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

Post by Kurieuo »

Thanks Jac,

You reminded me of an equivocation that I keep making, which seems easily done, when talking of substance.
That is, substance as in "stuff that something is made of" and substance as merely "something which exists in and of itself".

Are properties of substances, in the manner that you would apply substance to God, necessarily bad for DS?
I recall from a discussion we had ages ago you not being so keen on substance-property talk, but don't know if there was confusion about what I meant.

Is it only bad for DS if by "property of God" someone means some "part" within "divine matter", like "substance" would be bad if thinking of it as "spiritual matter"?
Compared to say "goodness" and "righteousness" which are properties of God's substance (in the "correct" manner of understanding substance).
DS though, tries to simplify God's attributes, so God "simplified" doesn't have this or that divine attribute right?
(I should really finish reading the other half of your book ;))
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Re: Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

Post by Jac3510 »

Just to be nitpicky, "stuff that something is made out of" wouldn't be a "substance" in Aristotelian/Thomistic thinking. That's how the term is used these days, but the proper word for that (in this school of thought) is "matter." So a hylomorphic substance is a form/matter composite, in which--and you well know this--the form accounts for "what" a thing is and the matter is what it is made out of and accounts for "that" it is (and is also the principle of individuation), and the whole being is called the substance. There is, though, a sense in which the form alone may be called a substance, insofar as forms can exist in themselves (matter cannot). The Scholastics thus distinguishes between primary and secondary substances, where the primary substance is the thing itself and the secondary substance is the nature or essence. Primary substances, then, can include matter (what things are made of); secondary substances do not include matter.

As to your question, you are right that I'm not too excited about property-language. We can use it if we are very specific in understanding it to mean "what is proper to," so that height is a "property" of man, not because it is an "accidental property" but because it is proper to speak of man's height (whereas it would be improper to speak of an angel's height). Here, a "property" is more akin to categories, and that which is not a property of some substance is not because it is improper, which means to speak of some property that does not belong to a substance (e.g., the height of an angel) would be a category mistake.

So given those qualifications, we can speak of God's properties. It is proper to speak of God's goodness and righteousness and love. But none of those properties are "properties" in the sense that Plantinga or Moreland use the term, as if they refer to distinct ontological realities in God. That kind is usage would be necessarily bad for DS. Given that, I think you are correct in saying "it only bad for DS if by 'property of God' someone means some 'part' within 'divine matter', like 'substance' would be bad if thinking of it as 'spiritual matter'." To use more traditional language, God has no accidents (because He is not a primary substance, and only primary substances have accidents). The "attributes" are those "things" which we attribute to God, but, again, they do not point to distinct ontological realities. The distinction between omniscience, omnipotence, righteousness, and goodness are distinctions of the mind only. They are different aspects under which we consider the Divine Nature. That is, thought of one way, the Divine Nature is something like what we call goodness. Thought of another way, it is something like what we call knowledge, and so on. Thus, God does not "have" any attributes. He just is this or that particular attribute (including Him being a Spirit, which in Greek, Hebrew, Latin, and in some distant sense even English (think of the etymology of "respiration") refer to breath and thus analogously to the principle of life, such that God as Spirit means that He does not have life but rather is life).
Proinsias wrote:I don't think you are hearing me. Preference for ice cream is a moral issue
And that, brothers and sisters, is the kind of foolishness you get people who insist on denying biblical theism. A good illustration of any as the length people will go to avoid acknowledging basic truths.
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Re: Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

Post by Kurieuo »

Jac wrote:Just to be nitpicky, "stuff that something is made out of" wouldn't be a "substance" in Aristotelian/Thomistic thinking. That's how the term is used these days, but the proper word for that (in this school of thought) is "matter." So a hylomorphic substance is a form/matter composite, in which--and you well know this--the form accounts for "what" a thing is and the matter is what it is made out of and accounts for "that" it is (and is also the principle of individuation), and the whole being is called the substance. There is, though, a sense in which the form alone may be called a substance, insofar as forms can exist in themselves (matter cannot). The Scholastics thus distinguishes between primary and secondary substances, where the primary substance is the thing itself and the secondary substance is the nature or essence. Primary substances, then, can include matter (what things are made of); secondary substances do not include matter.
I do follow what you're saying, but for "secondary substance" is using the term "nature" or "essence" really appropriate?
To me they connote "matter" and I can't conceptually distinguish these terms as merely "form".

Which brings me to some interesting thoughts, which you may/may not know more about within a historical philosophy.

Consider universals, for example, shapes -- circles, squares, triangles, etc.
They seem predicated upon mind that conceives of such, and I tend to believe they've always existed with God who has eternally conceived triangles, squares or circles.
But, there is some "substance" to the conception if you will of shapes, namely their shape which is like a blueprint in our mind.

What is the substance of that shape we view in our heads when we think: Circle?
Before we answer that, we must ask whether or not a "circle" is actualised in our head? I'd answer yes.
If yes, then we can then ask well what is the flavour of its materialisation -- what material is it?
Well, the substance of the circle we picture is qualitatively of some "mental" flavour being actualised.
Akin to a circle actualised in physical world that is cut from paper is qualitatively of a "paper" (or wood) flavour.

What is the importance of this?
Well, I'm not sure I can comprehend how shapes can exist without being actualised.
Blueprints (or "form") must at least be minimum of a "mental" material, and therefore substance will always have form+matter.
While we might abstract form out as the design of something, nonetheless it exists as in the form of a materialised concept.

Conclusion: I'm not sure that "form" can exist without "matter" of some flavour.

Perhaps this is where my own equivocations that I mention -- seeing substance in one sense as "form", and then seeing it as both "form" and "matter" -- keep rearing its head.
It just comes down to an inability of my own part to really separate "form" from "matter" given for me even a mental conception is comprised of "mental space" if you will.

Thoughts on this? In particular, are you aware to much discussion historically about whether "form" can really exist in and of itself?
I'm sure there has since pretty much anything that could be thought of has been discussed. So I like seeing with whom or what thinking my own logical reasoning aligns.
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Re: Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

Post by Jac3510 »

You are very close to the kingdom! ;)

So allow me the liberty to comment on your words in a more line by line fashion, because you have a lot here that is really, really good (at least, from a Thomistic perspective, and I'll offer some distinctions in that direction below--there are other schools of thought that would be even closer to what you are saying, e.g., Scotism, as far as I understand it).
Kurieuo wrote:I do follow what you're saying, but for "secondary substance" is using the term "nature" or "essence" really appropriate?
To me they connote "matter" and I can't conceptually distinguish these terms as merely "form".
It is appropriate insofar as the definition of a substance is really just that which exists in itself (if you want technical jargon, subsists). Further, look at the etymology of the word "substance." In this case, it's actually enlightening. A substance is that which "stands under"--stands under what? The accidents of our being. So you--the composite being--certainly stand under your accidents. But in a real way, so does your very essence (your humanity), and so it can be called a "substance" in a secondary sense.

Again, it's appropriate. Is it helpful? Usually not. I think when possible, we should use the words "form" or "nature" or "essence" which are all roughly synonymous even as they have different connotations.
Which brings me to an interesting thoughts, which you may/may not know more about and have been discussed historical within philosophy.

Consider universals, for example, shapes -- circles, squares, triangles, etc.
They seem predicated upon mind that conceives of such, and I tend to believe they've always existed with God who has eternally conceived triangles, squares or circles.
But, there is some "substance" to the conception if you will of shapes, namely their shape which is like a blueprint in our mind.
So I don't know that I'd call universals like shapes "substances." Here's where we can differentiate between forms and secondary substances. All secondary substances are forms, but not all are forms are secondary substances. So let me just strike out your word "substance" for a moment and revisit it again below. The bigger point you are making here is correct. (As an aside, the idea that all forms preexist in God's mind goes back at least as far as Augustine . . . one of the few things I think he was right on, so you're in good company!) It does seem impossible to imagine that a form like Triangularity could have any existence outside of either a mind or matter (and what if the mind is matter?). Historically, that's one of the main reasons that Platonists are, well, Platonists. Plantinga takes exactly this point to argue that Triangularity necessarily exists, and that it would necessarily exist even in a world where there are no real Triangles. It seems, after all, just silly if not self-contradictory to say, "In world X, there are no triangles, therefore, the form Triangularity does not exist." No, it would just be that the form is never actualized in any way. And that, in turn, does seem to point to an Eternal Mind . . .

Anyway, back to your point. We've still been a bit sloppy wit our terms. We jumped from universals right to the forms themselves, but the two are different. Obviously, the form of Triangularity exists outside the mind. You can see them all around you, and unless we are Idealists, and I know you are not, then triangles exist in nature regardless of who is there to observe them. But universals are an entirely different matter. For universals don't exist in the world. They exist in the mind only. After all, I bet you anything that you have never seen "Triangularity" or "Humanness" or "Dogness" or "Treeness." You've seen individual triangles and humans and dogs and trees. And somehow, your mind is able to abstract the general form from the particulars. That abstracted form is the universal.

The point here is your question about substances applies to universals and not forms per se. For if it only applied to forms, the answer would be easy: forms can exist outside the mind, which everyone other than Idealists will agree with. But since universals do not, then what about them?

You rightly point out that universals exist in the mind. Now the mind is a faculty of the rational soul, and the rational soul is a substance. Therefore, universals are always found in substances. But they have no substance of their own. The mind perceives the thing before it (first, it "judges" it to be, and then it "apprehends" the thing's nature/form) and abstracts that thing's nature and relates it to a universal (which the mind itself creates). The key here, though, is that the thing itself--the form--really is in the mind. It's not just a representation. The actual thing is in the mind, and we identify it and talk about it via the universal. (There are, by the way, a lot of technicalities associated with this process; the impressed species, the expressed species, the phantasm, the active and passive imagination, the formal word, etc. But the bottom line is actually pretty straight-forward: the actual form of the thing is impressed on the mind and abstracted into a universal)
What is the substance of that shape we view in our heads when we think: Circle?
I'll answer it now, anyway. It isn't a substance that is in our heads. It is a form or nature that is in our heads. But that consistent distinction aside, yes the form is "Circle."
Before we answer that, we must ask whether or not a "circle" is actualised in our head? I'd answer yes.
Correct! What was potentially there is now actually there.
If yes, then we can then ask well what is the flavour of its materialisation -- what material is it?
Well, the substance of the circle we picture is qualitatively of some "mental" flavour being actualised.
Akin to a circle actualised in physical world that is cut from paper is qualitatively of a "paper" (or wood) flavour.
And here is where I think the distinction I've been pushing is important. There is no material here, because the mind is immaterial. Yet the mind itself stands in potentiality to the forms of the world around it. So the thing in front of me possesses the form "Circularity." I apprehend the thing, and its form is impressed on my mind. My mind is "informed." But, again, yes, the mind, which was in potentiality to Circle, was so actualized by the form itself.

(Maybe it's important to note that matter is only actualized because matter is potentiality. What is actualized is ALWAYS potentiality. Now, some potentiality is matter, but not all potentiality is matter. So just because something is actualized, it does not follow that what is actualized is material)
What is the importance of this?
Well, I'm not sure I can comprehend how shapes can exist without being actualised.
You are right. They cannot!
Blueprints (or "form") must at least be minimum of a "mental" material, and therefore substance will always have form+matter.
While we might abstract form out as the design of something, nonetheless it exists as in the form of a materialised concept.
If the universal (not simply the form) exists, then there is a mind in which it exists. But since the mind is potentiality though not material, it does not follow that all substances are form+matter composites. Some substances can be pure forms (like angels). What is true, though, again, is that where the universal exists, there necessarily exists a mind in potentiality to that universal. I think that is what you are really getting at. There isn't a "mental substance." There's just the mind. THAT is what is informed, and what is comparable to matter. In nature, the circle informed a material thing. In your mind, it informed an immaterial thing. As an aside, that does mean, when thinking of God, that we have to be careful about saying that universals are in God in the same way that they are in us, since God is not in potentiality to the universal. But that should be obvious, because God has a "mind" only in an analogous way to us having a mind. They are in Him in that they are known by and caused by Him.
Conclusion: I'm not sure that "form" can exist without "matter" of some flavour.

Perhaps this is where my own equivocations that I mention -- seeing substance in one sense as "form", and then seeing it as both "form" and "matter" -- keep rearing its head.
It just comes down to an inability of my own part to really separate "form" from "matter" given for me even a mental conception is comprised of "mental space" if you will.

Thoughts on this? In particular, are you aware to much discussion historically about whether "form" can really exist in and of itself?
I'm sure there has since pretty much anything that could be thought of has been discussed. So I like seeing with whom or what thinking my own logical reasoning aligns.
I hope some of that is helpful. Even if you disagree with me you are, again, in good company. The idea that there is such a thing as "spiritual matter" is an old one, and one that Thomas Aquinas thought was serious enough he had to deal with it explicitly. Still, I think when we make the proper distinctions between form and substance, between matter and potentiality, we can see that form can exist without matter. And let me just give a very simple proof for that.

All matter is potentiality. There is no such thing as pure matter that has no form, for matter is only what it is once it is informed by some nature.
Forms are the active (actualizing) principle of things. In form/matter composites, form is the act, and matter is the potency.
Now, matter cannot exist by itself, because pure potentiality would be nothing at all, as pure potentiality would have no actuality. But pure actuality can exist. But that which is pure act would by definition have no potentiality, and since all matter is potentiality, then that which is pure act would be pure form.

It does not follow from this, of course, that any given thing is pure form, nor that all instances of pure form are pure act (angels are pure form but they are not pure act). But this ought to be sufficient to show that, in principle, form can exist without matter, though matter cannot exist without form.

Sorry for the length on this . . . :P
Proinsias wrote:I don't think you are hearing me. Preference for ice cream is a moral issue
And that, brothers and sisters, is the kind of foolishness you get people who insist on denying biblical theism. A good illustration of any as the length people will go to avoid acknowledging basic truths.
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Re: Is God Spirit? Divine Simplicity Implications.

Post by Kurieuo »

To respond to the second half of your message before last...
Jac3510 wrote:As to your question, you are right that I'm not too excited about property-language. We can use it if we are very specific in understanding it to mean "what is proper to," so that height is a "property" of man, not because it is an "accidental property" but because it is proper to speak of man's height (whereas it would be improper to speak of an angel's height). Here, a "property" is more akin to categories, and that which is not a property of some substance is not because it is improper, which means to speak of some property that does not belong to a substance (e.g., the height of an angel) would be a category mistake.

So given those qualifications, we can speak of God's properties. It is proper to speak of God's goodness and righteousness and love. But none of those properties are "properties" in the sense that Plantinga or Moreland use the term, as if they refer to distinct ontological realities in God. That kind is usage would be necessarily bad for DS. Given that, I think you are correct in saying "it only bad for DS if by 'property of God' someone means some 'part' within 'divine matter', like 'substance' would be bad if thinking of it as 'spiritual matter'." To use more traditional language, God has no accidents (because He is not a primary substance, and only primary substances have accidents). The "attributes" are those "things" which we attribute to God, but, again, they do not point to distinct ontological realities. The distinction between omniscience, omnipotence, righteousness, and goodness are distinctions of the mind only. They are different aspects under which we consider the Divine Nature. That is, thought of one way, the Divine Nature is something like what we call goodness. Thought of another way, it is something like what we call knowledge, and so on. Thus, God does not "have" any attributes. He just is this or that particular attribute (including Him being a Spirit, which in Greek, Hebrew, Latin, and in some distant sense even English (think of the etymology of "respiration") refer to breath and thus analogously to the principle of life, such that God as Spirit means that He does not have life but rather is life).
So to reinterpret and play back to you what I'm understanding.

Basically, you're saying according to DS theology:
If a "property" that we ascribe to God is merely a "descriptor" then that is fine.
BUT, if a "property" that we ascribe to God is also saying something about an individuated ontological part, then that isn't fine.

By "ontological part" you mean some "part" that is material rather than purely form don't you?

So for example, "goodness" is something that we describe God as being, but it's not that this exists as some individual material part within God.
To press upon the limits of DS boundaries, we could even loosely speak of "goodness" being a part of God --
SO LONG AS we understand that by "part" we only mean an aspect that God's revealed of His primary substance.

Am I correctly toying with the limits of DS and seeing where breaking away from DS would come into play --
THAT IS regarding God, his primary substance and properties (aka "attributes" or "aspects") thereof?
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