Abstract
The informing concept of divine absoluteness provides its own peculiar problems to the doctrine of God’s will. The task here is to set forth the problems and Thomas’ resolution of them, and then to examine the doctrine critically by uncovering its implications.
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References
Etienne Gilson, The Spirit of Medieval Philosophy, E. T., A. C. Downes, (New York: Charles Scribner’s, 1940 ), pp. 92–93.
The relation between the idea of God’s goodness and the divine creativity is set forth in St. Thomas Aquinas, On The Power of God,E. T. English Dominican Fathers (Westminster, Md., Newman Press, 1952), S. 4: “God wills creatures to exist for His goodness’ sake, namely that they may imitate and reflect it”. Thomas’ assumption here is that goodness can be actualized apart from communication with another being.
Cf. Aquinas, The Commentary on the Metaphysics of Aristotle,VI, 3, 1216: “It follows, then, that everything which occurs here insofar as it is related to the first divine cause is found to be ordained by it and not to be accidental, although it may be found to be accidental in relation to other causes”.
Robert Patterson, The Concept of God in the Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas, ( London: Allen, 1933 ), p. 439.
Cf. Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World,(New York: The Macmillan Company, 1925), ch. 11, for the extension of this line of reasoning. Whitehead’s argument for God takes off from the fact that this world is characterized by a determinate order of being and by concrete, finite things, and not by an indiscriminate modal pluralism. God is that principle necessary to account for this fact of concreteness and limitation. In other words, God functions to limit boundless and indeterminate possibility in order to allow for concrete and definite actuality.
Etienne Gilson, The Christian Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas, E.T., L. K. Shool, (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1939 ), p. 102.
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© 1974 Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, Netherlands
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Cooper, B.Z. (1974). God’s Will and Ontological Arbitrariness. In: The Idea of God. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-8093-1_3
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