Whether the properties presuppose the notional acts?
Objection 1: It would seem that the notional acts are understood
before the properties. For the Master of the Sentences says (Sent. i,
D, xxvii) that "the Father always is, because He is ever begetting the
Son." So it seems that generation precedes paternity in the order of
intelligence.
Obj. 2: Further, in the order of intelligence every relation
presupposes that on which it is founded; as equality presupposes
quantity. But paternity is a relation founded on the action of
generation. Therefore paternity presupposes generation.
Obj. 3: Further, active generation is to paternity as nativity is
to filiation. But filiation presupposes nativity; for the Son is so
called because He is born. Therefore paternity also presupposes
generation.
_On the contrary,_ Generation is the operation of the person of the
Father. But paternity constitutes the person of the Father. Therefore
in the order of intelligence, paternity is prior to generation.
_I answer that,_ According to the opinion that the properties do not
distinguish and constitute the hypostases in God, but only manifest
them as already distinct and constituted, we must absolutely say that
the relations in our mode of understanding follow upon the notional
acts, so that we can say, without qualifying the phrase, that "because
He begets, He is the Father." A distinction, however, is needed if we
suppose that the relations distinguish and constitute the divine
hypostases. For origin has in God an active and passive
signification--active, as generation is attributed to the Father, and
spiration, taken for the notional act, is attributed to the Father and
the Son; passive, as nativity is attributed to the Son, and procession
to the Holy Ghost. For, in the order of intelligence, origin, in the
passive sense, simply precedes the personal properties of the person
proceeding; because origin, as passively understood, signifies the way
to a person constituted by the property. Likewise, origin signified
actively is prior in the order of intelligence to the non-personal
relation of the person originating; as the notional act of spiration
precedes, in the order of intelligence, the unnamed relative property
common to the Father and the Son. The personal property of the Father
can be considered in a twofold sense: firstly, as a relation; and thus
again in the order of intelligence it presupposes the notional act,
for relation, as such, is founded upon an act: secondly, according as
it constitutes the person; and thus the notional act presupposes the
relation, as an action presupposes a person acting.
Reply Obj. 1: When the Master says that "because He begets, He is
Father," the term "Father" is taken as meaning relation only, but not
as signifying the subsisting person; for then it would be necessary
to say conversely that because He is Father He begets.
Reply Obj. 2: This objection avails of paternity as a relation, but
not as constituting a person.
Reply Obj. 3: Nativity is the way to the person of the Son; and so,
in the order of intelligence, it precedes filiation, even as
constituting the person of the Son. But active generation signifies a
proceeding from the person of the Father; wherefore it presupposes
the personal property of the Father.
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