Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Q29 A4: Whether this word "person" signifies relation?

Yes. A divine person signifies a relation as subsisting because this is to signify relation by way of substance, and such a relation is a hypostasis subsisting in the divine nature, although in truth that which subsists in the divine nature is the divine nature itself.

Thus it is true to say that the name "person" signifies relation directly, and the essence indirectly; not, however, the relation as such, but as expressed by way of a hypostasis.

So likewise it signifies directly the essence, and indirectly the relation, inasmuch as the essence is the same as the hypostasis: while in God the hypostasis is expressed as distinct by the relation: and thus relation, as such, enters into the notion of the person indirectly.

Relation in God is not as an accident in a subject, but is the divine essence itself; and so it is subsistent, for the divine essence subsists.