ARTICLE XV

In the Fifteenth Article We Ask: IS ANGELS' KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS DISCURSIVE?

Difficulties:

It seems that it is, for

1. Whoever knows one thing through another knows it discursively. Now, angels know one thing through another when they see creatures in the Word. Hence, their knowledge of things is discursive.

2. Just as we know some things and not others, so do angels also know some things and not others. This is clear from what has been said. But we are able to learn what we do not know by means of what we do know. Therefore, since angels possess more profound intellects than we, it seems that they, too, can come to a knowledge of what they do not know by means of what they know already. This, however, is discursive knowledge. Therefore, angels reason from one thing to another.

3. No motion can be detected in intellection other than that by which the mind passes from one thing to another. Now, angels are moved when they understand, and that is why Dionysius says that the motion of angels with respect to the good and the beautiful is circular, oblique, and horizontal, just as that of our own souls is. Therefore, angels, as well as our own souls, understand discursively.

4. As Augustine says, demons know the heart's thoughts by means of the movements that appear on the body. But this is to know the cause through the effect; it is also to reason from one thing to another. Therefore, demons know things by reasoning from one thing to another; and, by the same argument, angels also know in this manner, because the same kind of natural cognition is found in both angels and demons.

5. Maximus says that our souls roll many things together, just as angels do. Now, to roll many things together means to compare them. Therefore, angels know things by way of comparison.

6. Angels know natural causes and effects as perfectly as we do. Now, we see effects in causes and causes in effects. Therefore, angels do the same. Consequently, they make comparisons, just as we do.

7. All knowledge had through experience is knowledge had by a process of comparison, because, as said in the Metaphysics, it is based on experience, and the general apprehension results from the memory of many individual events. Now, as Augustine says, through their long experience demons come to know many things about natural effects. Therefore, demons possess knowledge that is the result of comparison.

To the Contrary:

1'. All discursive knowledge is had by reasoning either from the universal to particulars or from particulars to the universal, for all reasoning is reduced to syllogizing and induction. But, as Dionysius says, angels do not acquire divine knowledge from what is divisible or from senses, nor are they led to these particular things from something common. Therefore, there is no discursive knowledge in angels.

2'. Man is said to be rational inasmuch as he reasons by inquiring. As is clear from Dionysius, however, angels are not called rational but intellectual. Therefore, angels do not know discursively.

3'. As said in Spirit and Soul: "Reasoning is a search made by the reason." But in angels there is no reason, because, as is clear from the same work, reason is put into the definition of the human soul as being one of its properties. Therefore, angels neither reason nor have discursive knowledge.

4'. We read the following in Spirit and Soul: "It belongs to the same person to know the natures of visible things and to investigate invisible things." Now, the first type of knowledge belongs to man because of his senses, and the second type, too, for the same reason. Therefore, it seems that the second type of knowledge does not belong to angels, because they do not have senses.

5'. Maximus the Commentator writes that angels do not circle about a number of existing things as our souls do. Now, souls are said to circle about a number of existing things in so far as they reason from one thing to another. Therefore, angels do not know discursively.

REPLY:

Properly speaking, to discourse is to come to the knowledge of one thing through another. There is a difference, however, between knowing something in another and knowing it from another. For when one thing is known in another, the knower is, by one motion, directed to both. This is clearly the case when a thing is known in another as in an intelligible form. This kind of knowledge is not discursive. Moreover, in this regard, it makes no difference whether the thing be seen in its own species or in a different one; for sight is not said to know discursively when it sees a stone either by means of a species received from the stone itself or by seeing the stone's species reflected in a mirror.

A thing is said to be known from another, however, when the motion to both is not the same, but the intellect is first moved to one and from this is moved to the other. Consequently, discourse takes place here, as it evidently takes place in demonstrations. For the intellect is first directed only to principles, then it is directed through the principles to conclusions. From the moment of their creation, however, the intellects of angels are perfected by innate forms giving them all the natural knowledge to which their intellectual powers extend, just as the matter of celestial bodies is completely terminated by its form, with the result that it no longer remains in potency to another form. For this reason, The Causes states: "An intelligence is filled with forms." Now, it would not be filled with forms unless its entire potentialities were actuated by forms. Therefore, an intelligence is ignorant of none of the things that it can know naturally.

But because our intellect shares in a defective intellectual light, it is not actuated with regard to all the intelligibles which it can know naturally. It remains perfectible, nor could it reduce itself from potency to act had not its knowledge with respect to some things been actuated by nature. Consequently, there necessarily are some things in our intellect which it knows naturally, namely, first principles--even though in us this knowledge is not caused unless we receive something through our senses. Therefore, the relation of our intellect to those principles is similar to that which an angel has to all that he knows naturally. And since the knowledge we have of principles is the highest form of our knowledge, it is evident that on this summit of our nature we reach to some extent the lowest point of an angel's. For, as Dionysius says: "The divine wisdom has linked the boundaries of the first creatures to the place where the second begin." Consequently, just as we know principles by simple intuition without discourse, so do the angels know all they know in the same fashion. This is why they are called "intellectual," and why our habit of principles has the same name.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. Angels know creatures in the Word without any discourse, as things are known in their likenesses.

2. Angels are not ignorant of any of the things whose knowledge they can arrive at naturally; but they are ignorant of some things that surpass their natural knowledge. By themselves, they cannot arrive at a knowledge of these through discourse, but they need divine revelation. Our intellect, however, does not know all that it can know naturally. Hence, from the things it knows it can arrive at what it does not know. But, it cannot arrive at unknown things, such as matters of faith, that surpass our natural powers of knowing.

3. The motion of which Dionysius speaks is not taken to mean the passage from one thing to another. It is motion merely in that sense in which all operations are called motions, just as understanding and sensing are called motions. Consequently, Dionysius distinguishes three kinds of motions in souls and in angels as regards their knowledge of God: circular, oblique, and straight--using these as metaphors. Now, circular motion is perfectly uniform, because all the parts of a circle are equidistant from its center, and because it cannot be said that one part of a circular motion is its beginning or end more than any other. Straight motion, however, is not uniform, because as a line its parts are not equidistant from a designated point, and as motion it has a designated beginning and end. Oblique motion possesses uniformity in so far as it agrees with circular motion, but lacks uniformity in so far as it agrees with straight motion.

Now, there is not the same manner of uniformity and non-uniformity in an angel and in a soul. Consequently, Dionysius distinguishes between these motions as found in each. In the act of knowing God, an angel does not direct his cognition to many different things but fixes it on God alone. In this regard, he is said to be moved about God, as it were, in a circular motion, because he does not arrive at God as at the end of cognition that had its beginning from some principle of cognition, but [his knowledge is] like a circle, without a beginning or end. Hence Dionysius says that angels are moved "in a circular motion which is simple, without beginnings, and rich with everlasting illuminations of the good and the beautiful."

These divine illuminations coming into the minds of the angels are to be understood as though they were lines coming from the center of a circle to its circumference and in some way constituting the substance of the circumference. Then, the knowledge which God has of Himself is compared to the center of the circle, and the knowledge which the angel has of God is compared to the circle itself, which imitates the unity of its center but falls short of achieving it.

Non-uniformity in an angel's knowledge of God is not to be found in the knowledge itself but only in its communication, that is, in so far as he passes on his knowledge of God to others. This action Dionysius assigns to the angels' straight movement, saying: "Their motion is straight when, passing directly over all things, they go forth to provide for all who are entrusted to them." Moreover, he calls that motion of theirs oblique which is, as it were, made up of both of the afore-mentioned motions--the motion which occurs when, remaining united to God in knowledge, they go forth in action to lead others back to Him. Hence, he says: "They are moved obliquely when, while caring for those who have less, they nevertheless remain unmoved in uninterruptible union with the cause of union."

However, uniformity and non-uniformity are also found in the soul's knowledge of God, because a soul is moved towards God in three ways. In the first, by looking upon the visible things that have been made, the soul sees the invisible things of God. This motion is straight. Consequently, Dionysius says: "The motion of the soul is straight when the soul goes forth to the things which lie around it, and from external things, as from varied and multiple signs, is lifted up to simple and unified contemplation." The soul is moved toward God in a second way by the illuminations it receives from Him. These, however, it receives in accordance with its own manner of existence, that is, they are veiled in sensible figures. For example, Isaias saw "the Lord sitting upon a throne high and elevated" (Isaias 6:1). This motion is oblique, having something of uniformity from God's illumination and something of non-uniformity from the sensible figures. Hence, Dionysius says: "The soul is moved obliquely in so far as it is illumined by divine thoughts according to its nature--not, indeed, intellectually and intuitively, but rationally and discursively." Moreover, the soul is moved in a third way when it turns away from all sense objects by thinking of God as being above all things, even above itself. In this way, it is separated from any non-uniformity, and therefore it is circular motion. Hence, Dionysius says: "The circular motion of the soul takes place when, withdrawing from external things, the soul enters into itself and reflects by its intellectual powers. Finally, it is made uniform and enters into union with its united powers. In this way, it is led to that which is above all things."

4. Angels see thoughts hidden in hearts by means of bodily movements, just as causes are seen without discourse by means of their likeness in their effects. However, this does not mean that angels need to reason discursively when they know these motions for the first time, because, as soon as sensible things come into being, they become similar to forms in the angels and so are known by the angels. Hence, without discourse, angels know new sensible things.

5. That rolling together does not mean comparison, but rather a kind of circular union of the soul with itself, and of the angel with itself.

6. [Angels] see causes in their effects and effects in their causes, not by reasoning discursively, as it were, from one thing to another, but in the manner in which a thing is seen in its image, without any discourse being needed.

7. Demons' experiential knowledge is not had by making comparisons but by seeing effects in their causes or causes in their effects in the manner described. The longer they have existed, the greater the number of effects they know of a given cause. Thus, they come to know, in some way, more about a cause, not intensively but extensively, the more they see its power manifested in effects.