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Annotated Thomist
🕑 Added 2024-02-09 15:30:01 +0000 UTCWhether any other procession exists in God besides that of the Word?
Link: https://aquinas.cc/la/en/~ST.I.Q27.A3
C.f., Sent.I.D13.Q1.A2; SCG4.C19; QDePot.Q10.A2; DeRatio.C3
Thus far, we have investigated the first procession in the Godhead, i.e., Divine generation by way of intellection which produces the Son/Word. Yet, in other places, it is revealed that there is a second procession in the Godhead which is simply called "procession." This is spoken of in John 15:26, "the Spirit of truth who proceedeth from the Father."
How can this be? We have already established that there is only one enunciation, i.e., that of the Word. Further, we have established that intellection is an immanent rather than a transient operation (thus, preserving the unity of the Godhead).
Thus, in order to ground another procession (for, infinite fecundity of the Divine intellect has been exhaused by the enunciation of the Word), we must find another immanent operation. Is there a second operation of the soul that could remain within it? Anyone with a basic understanding of philosophical psychology will be able to tell you that there is. Along with the procession of knowing elicited by the intellect, there is also a procession of loving elicited by the will.
In knowing, we form a "mental word" within ourselves. When I stare across this room I am currently siting in, I see my wife. By sense perception, an intentional version of her is present within me, which is converted into the mental word by the processes of intellection. Yet, I do not only know her, I also love her. There is a certain "enunciation" of my love within me that is displayed by outward expressions of love that is often described as a certain kind of "impulse" or "movement." We have no common term for this enunciation as we do for intellection enunciation which we refer to as a "concept," "word," "image," "idea," etc. Yet, we know that it is there.
It is actually this hidenness, this obscurity, that St. Thomas asserts is one of the reasons for the designation of the terminus of the second procession as "Spirit," "the Spirit has a hidden origin, the property of which is love." (Emitte.12)
We may also reflect on the relationship between these two processions within our souls. There is a certain order between the procession of knowing and the procession of loving. First, I know my wife. Second, DEPENDENT UPON that concept of my wife in my mind, my will produces that enunciation of love within me.
We can, likewise, attribute this perfection to God. For, there is not only a Divine intellect, there is also a Divine will. God, in perfectly knowing Himself, intellectually enunciates a complete communication of the Divinity in a second person. Then, in loving through this Word, He volitionally enunciates a complete communication of the Divinity in a third person.
Respondeo: There are two processions in God; the procession of the Word, and another.
In evidence whereof we must observe that procession exists in God, only according to an action which does not tend to anything external, but remains in the agent itself. Such an action in an intellectual nature is that of the intellect, and of the will. The procession of the Word is by way of an intelligible operation. The operation of the will within ourselves involves also another procession, that of love, whereby the object loved is in the lover; as, by the conception of the word, the object spoken of or understood is in the intelligent agent. Hence, besides the procession of the Word in God, there exists in Him another procession called the procession of love.
