{"id":864,"date":"2009-05-16T15:42:02","date_gmt":"2009-05-16T19:42:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/?p=864"},"modified":"2009-05-15T06:43:36","modified_gmt":"2009-05-15T10:43:36","slug":"richard-of-st-victor-2-%e2%80%93-god%e2%80%99s-goodness-requires-charity-jt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/richard-of-st-victor-2-%e2%80%93-god%e2%80%99s-goodness-requires-charity-jt\/","title":{"rendered":"Richard of St. Victor 2 \u2013 God\u2019s goodness requires charity (JT)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\u201cListen
\u201cListen Luke, Claudia and I have something to tell you. This comes from a good place, because we love you. It\u2019s the 1980s now. Less gel, more blow dry.\u201c<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

STAGE 1. In this stage, Richard wants to show that God\u2019s perfect goodness somehow requires that God is perfectly charitable. I say \u2018somehow requires\u2019 because the logical relation here is not clear. Richard is saying \u2018God\u2019s goodness _____ perfect charity\u2019, but what fills in the blank? Is it \u2018entails\u2019, \u2018presupposes\u2019, or some other logical relation?<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the actual quotation, with the particular claims marked in brackets.<\/p>\n

\u2018[T1] there is [in God] fullness and perfection of all goodness. [T2] However, where there is fullness of all goodness, true and supreme charity cannot be lacking. [T3] For nothing is better than charity; nothing is more perfect than charity\u2019.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Let\u2019s look at T1, T2, and T3 in turn.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

(T1)\tGod is perfectly good, so there is as much goodness in God as possible.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Let\u2019s take this as a given, since Richard has already established it earlier in De Trinitate<\/em>.<\/p>\n

(T2)\tFor any x<\/em>, if x<\/em> is perfectly good, then x<\/em> is perfectly charitable.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What exactly does this mean? I see at least two options.<\/p>\n

(a) Perfect goodness and perfect charity are two distinct features that are necessarily instantiated together, similar to, say, being human and being able to laugh.<\/p>\n

(b) Perfect charity is what makes<\/em> something perfectly good, i.e, charity perfects<\/em> goodness, as if something can be really really good, but it won\u2019t be totally good until it becomes charitable.<\/p>\n

(T3)\tNothing is better than perfect charity.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The thrust of this is also rather unclear. There seem to be two things going on here.<\/p>\n

(a) Richard is saying that perfect charity is the best possible feature to have.<\/p>\n

(But why perfect charity? Why not cold, hard justice (like what the legendary \u2018soldering iron of justice\u2019 issues out)? Or why not being infinite, having aseity, or any other of God\u2019s perfect attributes?)<\/p>\n

(b) Richard appears to be stating T3 in order to buttress or prove T2.<\/p>\n

(But it\u2019s not evident exactly how T3 is supposed to buttress T2. Is it God\u2019s goodness<\/em> or God\u2019s perfection<\/em> which requires that he have all perfect features, the best of which is perfect charity)?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

STAGE 1. In this stage, Richard wants to show that God\u2019s perfect goodness somehow requires that God is perfectly charitable. I say \u2018somehow requires\u2019 because the logical relation here is not clear. Richard is saying \u2018God\u2019s goodness _____ perfect charity\u2019, but what fills in the blank? Is it \u2018entails\u2019, \u2018presupposes\u2019, or some other logical relation?… Read More »Richard of St. Victor 2 \u2013 God\u2019s goodness requires charity (JT)<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":865,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14,9,13,3],"tags":[40,41,22],"class_list":["post-864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","category-philosophy","category-theologians","category-theories","tag-richard-of-st-victor","tag-social-trinitarianism","tag-trinity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=864"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":891,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864\/revisions\/891"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/865"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}