Dist. 35, Art. 1, Q. 1
by St. Bonaventure
Source text: Public Domain Mark 1.0. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://bonaventure.wrootpress.com/browse/1/d/35/q/bon-sent-I-d35-a1-q1
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### Article Unique.
#### *On ideas.*

### Question I.
#### *Whether ideas are to be posited in God.*

So as to the first, it is asked whether one is to posit ideas in God. And that one is, is shown:

1. *First*, by the authority of Augustine, in the book *Of Eighty-Three Questions*: "Ideas are eternal and unchangeable forms, which are contained in the divine intelligence." From these three conditions it is concluded that idea is in God.

2. *Likewise*, by reason it is shown thus: every agent that acts rationally, not by chance or by necessity, foreknows the thing before it is; but every knower has the thing known either according to truth, or according to likeness; but things, before they are, cannot be had by God according to truth: therefore according to likeness. But the likeness of a thing, through which the thing is known and produced, is an idea: therefore etc.

3. *Likewise*, everything that determinately leads into the knowing of another, has with itself the likeness of the thing known, or is itself its likeness; but the eternal mirror leads the minds of those who see [it] into the knowledge of all created things, as Augustine says, that they know there more rightly than elsewhere: therefore it remains that likenesses reside in him. And it is established that they are in him as in a knower, since they represent not only to others, but to himself; but this is the whole account of an idea: therefore etc.

4. *Likewise*, since things are produced by God, therefore they are in God as in their efficient cause, and God is most truly the efficient cause; likewise, since they are bounded by him, therefore he is most truly the end: therefore by parity of reason, since by him they are known and expressed, God through himself is most truly the *exemplar*. But there is no exemplar except in which there are the ideas of the things exemplified: therefore etc.

**On the contrary:**

1. Dionysius, *On the Divine Names*: "The divine intellect knows, but from himself and through himself, not by sending himself into singulars according to an idea, but by knowing and containing all things according to the one cause of [his] excellence": therefore God does not know singulars through an idea.

2. *Likewise*, by reason it appears: because *idea* asserts an account of *likeness*, and *likeness* asserts an account of *agreement*; but between God and the creature, since there is the greatest distance, there is no agreement, or if there is, it is the least: therefore either there is no likeness, or the least. Either, then, there is no idea in God, or if there is, it is according to an imperfect account; but nothing imperfect is to be posited in God: therefore etc.

3. *Likewise*, the most noble mode of knowing is to be attributed to God; but knowing through the essence of the thing is more noble than through the likeness of the thing: therefore God knows through the essence of the thing, not through likeness. But idea is a likeness, not the essence of the thing: and so etc.

4. *Likewise*, idea is not necessary except for *directing* in knowing and *regulating* in operating; but nothing needs a director or regulator except what can err or deviate. But God has none of these: therefore ideas are placed in God in vain.

### Conclusion.

> *God knows through ideas, and has in himself the accounts and likenesses of the things which he knows.*

**I respond:** It must be said that on this point there has been a twofold opinion.

For some have said that God does not know according to the account of *idea*, but according to the account of *cause*. And they propose a likeness: as if a point knew its own power, it would know lines and the circumference; likewise, if unity had a cognitive power, by which it could turn itself upon itself, it would know all numbers. In this way, they say, it stands in God. For since God has the power of producing all things, and knows his whole power, therefore he knows all things. And this, they say, Dionysius held, when he said that "not according to idea, but according to the one cause of [his] excellence does he know all things." —

But this position cannot stand. *First* indeed, because God knows not by collation, going from principle to the principled, but by simple regard. And again, every knower, insofar as he is such, is similar to the knowable: therefore he has the likeness of it, or he himself is its likeness. Again, every knower produces distinctly because he knows distinctly, and not the converse: therefore the account of *producing* is not the account of *knowing*. And again, he knows certain things which are not from him. On account of these and similar [reasons] one must speak otherwise.

Therefore there is another position, both according to the Saints and the opinion according to the philosophers, that God knows through ideas, and has in himself the accounts and likenesses of the things which he knows; in which not only does he himself know, but also those who look unto him: and these accounts Augustine calls *ideas* and *primordial causes*.

But for the understanding of the objections, it must be understood that *idea* is said [to be] the *likeness of the thing known*. But likeness is said in two ways: in one way, according to the agreement of two things in a third, and this is likeness according to *univocation*; in another way it is likeness, insofar as one is said to be the likeness of the other; and this likeness does not concern agreement in something common, since likeness is itself similar of itself, not in a third; and in this way the creature is called the likeness of God, or, conversely, God [the likeness] of the creature.

> *(Conclusion 2.)* In this way, taking likeness, the likeness is the *account of knowing*, and this is called *idea*. — But it is otherwise in us, otherwise in God. *(Note: the difference of the account of knowing in us and in God.)* In us indeed the account of knowing is *likeness*, and the thing known is *truth*. For in us there is a likeness received and impressed from outside, on account of this, that our intellect with respect to the known is *possible* and not pure act; therefore it is brought into act through something of the known, which is its likeness. In God, however, it is the converse, for the account of knowing is *truth itself*, and the known is the *likeness of the truth*, namely, the creature itself. And since the account of knowing consists in the very first truth, *(Note.)* therefore the account of knowing in God is *most expressive*. And since everything that most expresses, most perfectly assimilates the known by an assimilation befitting knowing, therefore it is clear that the truth itself, *(Conclusion 1.)* by this, that it makes [things] to be known, is an *expressive likeness* and *idea*. The contrary is in us, since by the very fact that [the likeness] is a likeness, it makes [things] to be known. From these the objections are clear.

**Solution of the opposed [arguments].**

1. As to what is objected, that "not by sending himself into singulars according to an idea"; it must be said that Dionysius does not by this wish to remove the account of *idea* from God, but wishes to say that the multitude and difference of ideas according to singulars is not so [in God] as it is in us.

2. As to what is objected, that there is no agreement, or [at most] the least; it must be said that there is *(threefold likeness.)* a likeness of *univocation* or *participation*, a likeness of *imitation*, and [a likeness] of *expression*. The likeness of participation is altogether none, because nothing is common. The likeness of imitation is small, because in a small [degree] the finite can imitate the infinite, whence dissimilitude is always greater than similitude. But the likeness of expression is supreme, since it is caused by the *intention of truth*, as has been seen, which is the very expression itself; therefore God most supremely knows all things.

3. As to what is objected thirdly, that knowing through essence is more noble; it must be said that there is a likeness *caused by the truth of the thing outside*, and concerning this it is true that it never expresses the thing so perfectly as the thing itself [would] if it were present to the soul, and by this likeness God does not know. There is another likeness, which is the very *expressive truth of the known*, and is a likeness in that it is truth; and this likeness expresses the thing better than the thing itself expresses itself, since the thing itself receives its account of expression *from* it: and according to this is the more perfect knowing, and by this God knows.

4. As to what is objected, that idea is for *regulating and directing*; it must be said that being-regulated and being-directed can be in two ways: either by a rule different from the directed and regulated, and this posits imperfection and the possibility of error; or by a rule which is the same as the regulated, and this posits the impossibility of error. For since the rule cannot err, and God is himself the rule and idea: therefore it is impossible that he err. And so it is clear that idea in God does not posit imperfection, but completion.

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