Last time, I explained that Athanasius has not made it clear how the Son ‘inherits’ divine properties from the Father. Yet even if Athanasius could explain how the Son ‘inherits’ properties from the Father, there’s still another problem. Like Arius, Athanasius believes that the Father is simple, and so anything ‘in’ the Father is, strictly speaking, identical to the Father. If the Son is going to inherit any properties from the Father, then surely he’d have to inherit them all. As Athanasius himself realizes, it’s not a question of the Son inheriting part of the Father. It’s a question of all or none.
However, there are certain properties the Son cannot inherit from the Father, on pain of contradiction. For instance, the Son cannot inherit the Father’s unbegotteness. The Son is begotten, but the Father is not, so the can’t inherit the Father’s unbegotteness without entailing a contradiction.
We get a similar problem if we focus our attention on the Father’s fatherhood. If the Son inherited the Father’s fatherhood, he would be the Father of himself. But the Son is not the Father of himself, so we’d get a contradiction here too.
One might interject that the Son only inherits God’s essential properties, and not, say, his fatherhood. Unfortunately, Athanasius frequently says that the Father (who, recall, is God) is essentially a Father. When he says this, he is reacting to Arius. As Athanasius sees it, Arius seems to think that God became a Father when he begat the Son, and that implies that God can change (e.g., from not being a Father to being a Father). But since God cannot change, Athanasius insists that the Father is essentially a Father.
I take it, then, that Athanasius thinks the Father’s essential properties include his fatherhood in addition to divine properties like omnipotence, goodness, and so forth. If the Son inherits the Father’s nature, however, then surely the Son would inherit all the Father’s essential properties (including his fatherhood).
Thus, it looks as if the Father’s simplicity means that the Son must inherit all or none of the Father’s properties. But since there’s at least one or two properties that the Son can’t inherit, it would seem to follow that the Son can’t inherit any of the Father’s properties. Unless Athanasius can offer a principled way to explain why the Son only inherits some of the Father’s properties but not others, then his theory will collapse into contradictions and impossibility.
(I’ve focused my attention here on divine properties like omnipotence and goodness, but those aren’t the only properties I wonder about. What about God’s intellect and will? Does Athanasius think the Son inherits the Father’s intellect and will too? If Athanasius can’t explain how the Son gets his intellect and will, then how could the Son be a person? Surely a person has to have an intellect and will.)
Next time (which is the last post in this series), I will conclude with some general questions about divine production.
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Scott,
With regard to the question “whats the difference between a property and a relation?”: I have trouble understanding what the difference is myself. Maybe someone else who has a better grasp of Thomas’s view can help out here. Personally, I take it that relations “connect” property-bearers according to their properties. The relation “taller than” relates a thing that is six inches tall to something that is three inches tall.
But how the “relation” of Fatherhood connects the Father to the Son, I don’t know. For Thomas the Father and Son have identical essential properties and no accidental properties. So why the Father is the Father of the Son and the Son is not the Father of the Father… again, I don’t know. I don’t endorse Thomas’s view, I’m just trying to understand it.
With regard to your question about “epistemically individuating features,” I guess I should have just said “individuating features.” I don’t think there can be anything which is merely epistemically individuating. If a thing individuates something from something else, then it both metaphysically and epistemically individuates that thing.
Anyway, I’m sure there are much better defenders of Thomistic Latin Trinitarianism out there. I’d personally like to get a better grasp of the view. For my part, I can’t make sense of how mere relations (without any underlying property differences) individuate any two things.
Dear Theology Student,
Could you explain this a bit more:
“the proponent of simplicity is forced to argue that the fatherhood of the father is not a real property but, entirely a relation.” What’s the difference here btwn. a property and a relation?
Also, you write:
“The same goes for the “epistemically individuating” features of the Son and the Spirit; they are distinguished by relations, not properties.”
By saying “epistemically individuating” are you saying that there are no ‘real’ features that distinguish one divine person from another? A relation might do it — but it remains to be seen just how you understand Aquinas’s theory of relations in this context.
I’m not sure how well the early fathers understood the implications of divine simplicity. Thomas, of course, had a much better grasp of the concept, but the early fathers seem to like to have things both ways. That is, to speak of God as simple and then also speak of God as having properties in some real way.
Anyway, I wonder whether a defender of simplicity would want to say that the Son inherits the Father’s “properties” seeing as simple beings don’t have properties, per se.
As I understand this problem (more so through Thomas than Athanasius) the proponent of simplicity is forced to argue that the fatherhood of the father is not a real property but, entirely a relation. The same goes for the “epistemically individuating” features of the Son and the Spirit; they are distinguished by relations, not properties.
The big problem, I think, for this view is that the relations (like the relation of fatherhood which uniquely relates one divine person from another divine person with identical properties) is that it hangs on nothing. There is no underlying monadic property difference on which the relation subsists.
Of course, the relation “taller than” could not possibly relate two persons who are exactly the same height, so I don’t understand how this mysterious relation is supposed to individuate the Father as the Father in relation to the Son. But, as I understand it, the advocate of simplicity won’t grant that there is a property called “fatherhood” that is had by the first person of the Trinity.
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