Knowledge and the Transcendent: An Inquiry into the Mind's Relationship to God

4. Having God in View

135 Chapter 4 Having God in View Direct Realism and the Beatific Vision Aquinas’s commitment to direct realism extends far beyond his account of empirical cognition or knowledge. For Aquinas the theologian, beatific knowledge of God—or the knowledge of God possessed by the blessed in heaven—is itself a paradigm case of direct realism in cognition. Aquinas’s remarkable main claim, which I will explicate below, is that in the supernatural cognitive state of beatitude, “the essence of God itself becomes the intelligible form of the intellect.”1 This means that in beatitude, God is not present to the intellect by means of an intelligible species or form, which in the case of empirical cognition ‘informs’ thought in order to unite mind and world; rather, God is directly and immediately present to the intellect in such a way as to unite the mind with God. In short, on Aquinas’s broader theological view, it is because God in beatitude is the intelligible form of the intellect that God can be known or ‘seen’ by beatified persons directly and objectively, or “as God is.”2 1. ST I.12.5. 2. As a reminder, I will be using single quotes throughout the chapter when using terms typically associated with acts of sense, which I am extending (following Aquinas) to depict unique acts of intellect in the beatific state. So, for example, while persons see or perceive the world with their senses in their natural state, beatified persons ‘see’ or ‘perceive’ God with their intellects or minds. 136 contribution of thomistic epistemology My purpose in this chapter is to further articulate and defend this Thomistic claim, and I do so by showing how beatific knowledge of God is a form of intellective cognition, or a genuine intellective ‘vision’ of the divine essence. Thus I argue that the ‘vision’ of the divine essence that beatified persons enjoy in the supernatural cognitive state of beatitude, in which God is known or ‘seen’ directly, should be understood on analogy with empirical knowledge of the world, which cognitive subjects enjoy in their natural cognitive state. Direct sensation and apprehension of the empirical world occurs when both the senses and mind, qua cognitive capacities, are ‘informed’ and hence actualized by their proper objects—sensible and intelligible form. Analogously, in the supernatural cognitive state of beatitude, direct knowledge of God occurs when the glorified intellect, qua supernaturalized cognitive capacity, is ‘informed’ and hence actualized by its proper object: the divine essence itself. God’s direct presence to the intellect as its intelligible form actualizes beatified persons’ intellective capacities, yielding distinct intellective episodes— and specifically, a content-rich ‘vision’ or ‘perception’ of God—that afford beatified persons direct epistemic access to the objective layout of divine reality. It is precisely in this sense that Aquinas commits himself to direct realism in his account of beatific knowledge of God. Of course, while beatific knowledge of God bears crucial analogies to empirical knowledge of the world, it also utterly surpasses such knowledge and thus is only ultimately intelligible given certain fundamental theological presuppositions. Thus, explicating Aquinas’s account of beatific knowledge requires introducing and incorporating the following premises: first, that God possesses both intellect and will and so possesses the capacity to unite God’s self to the intellect in beatitude; second, that God is not only intelligible to God’s self but also intelligible to the created intellect; and third, that the intellect can be elevated by grace in such a way that possessors of intellect can enjoy a direct intellective ‘vision’ of God. My goal is to use and interpret these premises—offered by Aquinas himself—in order to show how beatific knowledge of God for Aquinas is a supernatural form of cognition that transcends ordinary empirical cognition and yet also bears crucial similarities to ordinary empirical cognition. The chapter will unfold as follows. In the first section, I exposit Aquinas’s account of beatific knowledge of God as Aquinas primarily presents it in the Summa theologiae, Summa contra gentiles, and De veritate. In section two, I undertake my main interpretive task in the chapter and explicate beatific knowledge of God in Aquinas as an intellective ‘vision’ or ‘perception’ of the the beatific vision 137 divine essence that the blessed enjoy when God impresses God’s self on the intellect, drawing supernaturally charged intellective capacities into operation so that the blessed may genuinely know or...