Saturday, June 27, 2009

Q105 A3: Whether God moves the created intellect immediately?

Yes. God moves the created intellect, because He gives it the power to understand (whether natural, or superadded) and because He impresses intelligible species on it: and maintains and preserves both power and species in be-ing.

Deus movet intellectum creatum
, inquantum dat ei virtutem ad intelligendum (vel naturalem vel superadditam) et inquantum imprimit ei species intelligibiles: et utrumque tenet et conservat in esse.

The intellectual operation is indeed performed by the intellect in which it exists, as by a secondary cause; but it proceeds from God as from its first cause. For by Him the power to understand is given to the one who understands.

Operatio intellectualis est quidem ab intellectu in quo est, sicut a causa secunda; sed a Deo sicut a causa prima. Ab ipso enim datur intelligenti quod intelligere possit.

The intellectual light together with the likeness of the thing understood is a sufficient principle of understanding; but it is a secondary principle, and depends upon the First Principle.

Lumen intellectuale, simul cum similitudine rei intellectae, est sufficiens principium intelligendi; secundarium tamen, et a primo principio dependens.

The intelligible object moves our human intellect, inasmuch as, in a way, it impresses on it its own likeness, by means of which the intellect is able to understand it. But the likenesses which God impresses on the created intellect are not sufficient to enable the created intellect to understand Him through His Essence, as we have seen above (Q12, A2; Q56, A3). Hence He moves the created intellect, and yet He cannot be intelligible to it, as we have explained (Q12, A4).

Intelligibile movet intellectum nostrum, inquantum quodammodo imprimit ei suam similitudinem, per quam intelligi potest. Sed similitudines quas Deus imprimit intellectui creato, non sufficiunt ad ipsum Deum intelligendum per essentiam, ut supra habitum est. Unde movet intellectum creatum, cum tamen non sit ei intelligibilis, ut dictum est.

As in corporeal movement that is called the mover which gives the form that is the principle of movement, so that is said to move the intellect, which is the cause of the form that is the principle of the intellectual operation, called the movement of the intellect.

Sicut in motibus corporalibus movens dicitur quod dat formam quae est principium motus, ita dicitur movere intellectum, quod causat formam quae est principium intellectualis operationis, quae dicitur motus intellectus.

Now there is a twofold principle of intellectual operation in the intelligent being: one which is the intellectual power itself, which principle exists in the one who understands in potentiality; while the other is the principle of actual understanding, namely, the likeness of the thing understood in the one who understands. So a thing is said to move the intellect, whether it gives to him who understands the power of understanding, or impresses on him the likeness of the thing understood.

Operationis autem intellectus est duplex principium in intelligente: unum scilicet quod est ipsa virtus intellectualis, quod quidem principium est etiam in intelligente in potentia; aliud autem est principium intelligendi in actu, scilicet similitudo rei intellectae in intelligente. Dicitur ergo aliquid movere intellectum, sive det intelligenti virtutem ad intelligendum, sive imprimat ei similitudinem rei intellectae.

Now God moves the created intellect in both ways. For He is the first immaterial being; and as intellectuality is a result of immateriality, it follows that He is the first understanding being. Therefore since the first in each order is the cause of all that follows, we must conclude that from Him proceeds all power of understanding.

Utroque autem modo Deus movet intellectum creatum. Ipse enim est primum ens immateriale. Et quia intellectualitas consequitur immaterialitatem, sequitur quod ipse sit primum intelligens. Unde cum primum in quolibet ordine sit causa eorum quae consequuntur, sequitur quod ab ipso sit omnis virtus intelligendi.

In like manner, since He is the first being, and all other beings pre-exist in Him as in their first cause, it follows that they exist intelligibly in Him, after the mode of His own Essence. For as the intelligible formal aspects of all things exist first of all in God, and are derived from Him by other intellects, in order that these may actually understand, so also are they derived by creatures that they may subsist.

Similiter cum ipse sit primum ens, et omnia entia praeexistant in ipso sicut in prima causa, oportet quod sint in eo intelligibiliter secundum modum eius. Sicut enim omnes rationes rerum intelligibiles primo existunt in Deo, et ab derivantur in alios intellectus, ut actu intelligant, sic etiam derivantur in creaturas ut subsistant.