A Contradiction in Saint Thomas’s Teaching on Creation

A CONTRADICTION IN SAINT THOMAS'S TEACHING ON CREATION THEODORE J. KONDOLEON Villanova University Villanova, Pennsylvania 0 THOSE FAMILIAR with Saint Thomas's writings is generally known that the Angelic Doctor changed his position on a number of philosophical issues during the course of his relatively short professional career. For instance, there is his opinion concerning the instrumental role of higher creatures in the creation of the universe-something he allowed as possible in his Commentary on the Sentences but later rejected in his Disputed Question On the Power of God and in the Summa Theologiae. Another example is Thomas's view on the possibility of an actual infinite multitude, an opinion he accepted in the early Disputed Question On Truth but argued against in the Summa Theologiae.1 However, to change one's mind on a particular issue is not to contradict oneself, since to do that is to say or hold, in the same time frame, pwhile also saying or holding not p. However, in his Treatise on Creation in the Summa Theologiae, Saint Thomas does, at least once, contradict himself in what he has to say on the question of the demonstrability of the world's temporal beginning , a contradiction which, to my knowledge, has never previous1 On the question whether higher creatures can be instrumental causes in the creation of lower creatures see In Sent. IV, d. 5, q. 5, a. 3; De potentia Dei, q. 3, a. le and Summa Theologiae, I, q, 45, a. Sc. On the issue of an actual infinite multitude see D. Q. De veritate, q. 2, a. 9 and Summa Theologiae , 1, q. 7, a. 5. However, in the De aeternitate mundi-a work possibly written after Saint Thomas completed the first part of his Summa-Aquinas asserts, towards the end of this work, that no demonstration has as yet been forthcoming that God cannot produce a multitude that is actually infinite. 51 52 THEODORE J. KONDOLEON ly been noted. In what follows I intend to expose this contradiction and to see whether there is any possible way for him to escape it. I In article 1 of Question 46 of the Prima pars, Aquinas argues that it cannot be demonstrated that the world of creatures always existed, given that the actual existence of creatures depends upon the causal will of God and the only thing which God wills necessarily is Himself.2 Consequently, whether or not the world exists, or is created eternally or with a temporal beginning, are matters entirely up to God's free will.3 In the following article he argues that neither can the world's temporal beginning be demonstrated but that this is something known only by faith.4 It cannot be demonstrated from the world itself since demonstration proceeds by way of knowledge of the universal essences of things and universals abstract from the hie et nunc, or from the question of temporal origin.5 Nor can it be proved from the world's efficient cause-the divine will-seeing that God's will cannot be investigated by reason except as regards those things which God wills necessarily (and what He wills about creatures is not among 2 " Dicendum nihil praeter Deum ab aeterno fuisse. Et hoc ponere non est impossibile. Ostensum est enim supra quad voluntas Dei est causa rerum. Sic ergo necesse est esse sicut necesse est Deum velle ilia, cum necessitatis effectus ex necessitate causae dependeat, ut dicitur in Meta. Ostensum est autem supra quod, absolute loquendo, non est necesse Deum velle aliquid nisi seipsum." ST I, q. 46, a. le. Latin quotations from Saint Thomas appearing in the footnotes are from the Leonine edition. 3 " Non est ergo necessarium Deum velle quod mundus fuerit semper. Sed eatenus mundus est quatenus Deus vult illum esse, cum esse mundi ex voluntate dependeat, sicut ex sua causa. Non est igitur necessarium mundum semper esse: Unde nee demonstrative probari potest." Ibid. 4 " Dicendum quod mundum non semper fuisse sola fidei tenetur, et demonsrtative probari non potest; sicut et supra de mysterio Trinitatis dictum est." Ibid., a. 2c. 5 "Et hujus ratio est, quia novitas mundi non potest demonstrationem recipere ex parte ipsius mundi...