We’re blogging through St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae, sometimes called his Shorter Summa. Find the previous posts here. Today’s post is from Chapter 63, “Personal Acts and Personal Properties.” In this chapter, Thomas continues working out how the standard metaphysical concepts apply in the context of the Trinity. For Thomas, how a thing acts follows from what it is. Separated from the tree, apples ripen, become mellow, and ultimately rot (if they aren’t eaten). This is what apples do, because they are apples.... Read more

We’re blogging through St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae, sometimes called his Shorter Summa. Find the previous posts here. Today’s post is from Chapter 61, “Dependence of the Hypostases on the Personal Properties”. I'm afraid that things will continue to be difficult and technical for another half-dozen chapters, before we conclude with the Trinity and move on to (very slightly) less lofty concerns. We've been talking about the personal properties that distinguish the Divine Persons from one another: paternity, filiation, and procession. Each of... Read more

We’re blogging through St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae, sometimes called his Shorter Summa. Find the previous posts here. Today’s post is from Chapter 59, “Why These Properties Are Called Notions”. NOTE: This post should have appeared a couple of weeks ago. I wrote it, and then forgot to post it. My apologies; it was a difficult week, as my mother-in-law had just passed away. Here is the post, (alas) out of sequence. In the past two chapters, Thomas has been describing the properties... Read more

We’re blogging through St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae, sometimes called his Shorter Summa. Find the previous posts here. Today’s post is from Chapter 60, “The Number of Relations and the Number of Persons”. My intent is to blog through the entire Compendium Theologiae, but some chapters I really wish I could skip, and this is one of them. In the past few chapters, Thomas has identified three subsisting persons in God, as defined by five properties or notions: innascibility, paternity, filiation, spiration, and... Read more

We’re blogging through St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae, sometimes called his Shorter Summa. Find the previous posts here. Today’s post is from Chapter 57, “Properties of the Father”. In today's outing, Thomas isn't so much sketching a proof, or explaining a point of theology, as he is making some definitions. Such being the number of persons in God, the properties whereby the persons are distinguished from one another must be of some definite number. Three properties are characteristic of the Father. In scholastic... Read more

We’re blogging through St. Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium Theologiae, sometimes called his Shorter Summa. Find the previous posts here. Today’s post is from Chapter 55, “Personal Distinction in God through the Relations”. Thomas continues his analysis of the Trinity by affirming that the three members of the trinity are persons, and are so precisely because the relations that define them are subsistent. Since distinction in the Godhead is accounted for by relations that are not accidental but are subsistent, and since among beings subsisting... Read more