ARTICLE VII

In the Seventh Article We Ask: IS TRUTH AS APPLIED TO GOD PREDICATED PERSONALLY OR ESSENTIALLY?

Difficulties:

It seems that it is predicated personally, for

1. In regard to God, whatever implies the relation of origin is predicated personally. But truth belongs to this class, as is clear from Augustine; for he says that the divine truth is "the greatest possible likeness of its source, without any unlikeness" from which falseness arises. Therefore, truth is predicated personally of God.

2. Just as nothing is similar to itself, so also, nothing is equal to itself. But, according to Hilary, from the fact that nothing is similar to itself, likeness in God implies a distinction of persons. The same reasoning can be applied to equality. But truth is a certain equality. Therefore, truth implies a distinction of persons in God.

3. Whatever implies procession in God is predicated personally of Him. But truth implies a certain procession since it signifies an intellectual concept just as a word does. Therefore, just as the Word is predicated personally, so also is truth.

To the Contrary:

Augustine says that of the three Persons there is but one truth. Therefore, it is something essential, not personal.

REPLY:

In regard to God, truth can be taken in two ways: properly and, as it were, metaphorically. If truth is taken properly, then it will imply an equality of the divine intellect and of a thing. Since the first thing the divine intellect knows is its own essence, through which it knows all other things, truth in God principally implies an equality between the divine intellect and a thing which is its essence; and, in a secondary sense, truth likewise implies an equality of the divine intellect with created things.

The divine intellect and the divine essence are not, however, made equal to each other in the way in which a measure is related to what is measured, since one is not the source of the other, but both are entirely identical. Consequently, the truth resulting from such equality does not involve its having the character of a source, whether it be considered from the standpoint of the essence or from that of the intellect, since both in this case are one and the same. For, just as in God the knower and the thing known are the same, so also in Him the truth of the thing and that of intellect are the same, without any connotation of origin.

But if the truth of the divine intellect be considered in its conformity to created things, the same truth will still remain; for God knows Himself and other things through the same means. However, there is added to the concept of truth the note of origin with respect to creatures, to which the divine intellect is compared as a measure and cause. Moreover, in theological matters every name which does not imply the notion of origin or of being from a principle is predicated essentially. And even if the name implies the notion of origin of creatures, it still is also predicated essentially. Consequently, if truth is taken properly in whatever pertains to God, it is predicated essentially; yet it is appropriated to the person of the Son, as are also art and all else pertaining to intellect.

Truth is taken metaphorically or figuratively in divine matters when we take it according to that formal character by which truth is found in created things. For in these, truth is said to exist inasmuch as a created thing imitates its source, the divine intellect. Similarly, when truth is applied to God and is said to be the highest possible imitation of its principle, this is attributed to the Son. Taken in this way, truth properly belongs to the Son and is predicated personally; and this, too, is what Augustine says.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. The response is clear from the reply.

2. When equality is referred to divine things it sometimes implies a relation that indicates a distinction of Persons--as when we say that the Father and the Son are equal. In this respect a real distinction is understood in the word equality. Sometimes, however, a real distinction is not understood in the word equality, but merely a rational distinction, as when we say that the divine wisdom and the divine goodness are equal. Hence, equality does not necessarily imply a distinction of persons. Such also is the distinction implied in the word truth, since truth is an equality of intellect and essence.

3. Although truth is conceived by the intellect, the notion of a concept is not expressed by the word truth as it is by the term word. Hence, no analogy can be drawn.