Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: The Trinune God: Systematics

Titel: The Triune God: Systematics

Stichwort: Liebe, Hervorgang, Analogie; das Gute 1-4 (konkret; analoges Wissen davon; Ordnungsgut; Weisheit); universales (durch Wesenheit) - partikuläres Gut; Kosmos, Ordnung, Inkarnation

Kurzinhalt: Since to love is to will good to someone or something ... it seems we ought to start from good as the object of love...

Textausschnitt: 26 The Analogy of Proceeding Love

671c Since to love is to will good to someone or something (Summa theologiae, 1, q. 20, a. 3), it seems we ought to start from good as the object of love. (Fs)

671d First, then, every good is concrete. The true and the false, since they are in the mind, can be abstract and universal inasmuch as things are known not in act but in potency, and not completely but incompletely ([Aristotle] Metaphysics, XIII, 10, 1087a 15-19). But good and evil, on the other hand, are not in the mind but in things (In VI Metaphys., lect. 4, § 1240), and hence every good is concrete. For good and being and ontological truth are convertible. (Fs)

671e Second, as being is known only analogically, so also can we in this life know good only analogically. And so just as we go from finite beings by way of a certain proportion to arrive at some sort of conception of being itself, in the same way we must proceed from particular goods to the universal good. 'The universal good is that which is good in itself and by its essence, because it is the very essence of goodness itself; but a particular good is good by participation' (Summa theologiae, 1, q. 103, a. 2 c). Hence, as the divine essence is the universal principle of all being, so the divine goodness is the universal principle of all good. It follows, therefore, that all things desire God by the very fact that they desire any thing in any way (ibid. q. 44, a. 4, ad 3m). For insofar as they desire something, they desire it on account of some good; and if they desire something on account of some good-by-participation, all the more do they desire it on account of the universal good, since that which gives to a thing a certain perfection, itself possesses that perfection all the more. (Fs)

673a Third, in addition to particular goods which need to be put into some order, there exists the good of order itself whereby they are ordered. Thus, men seek economic goods and devote all their physical and mental resources to securing them; but much more do they desire and eagerly strive for the good of the economic order itself, without which all industrial and commercial activity grinds to a halt. Hence Aquinas's remarks about the excellence of order, (1) that 'the universe [Greek: cosmos, 'order'] as a whole is a more perfect participation and manifestation of the divine goodness than is any individual creature whatsoever' (Summa theologiae, 1, q. 47, a. 1 c), (2) that 'the end of the universe is a good existing within it, namely, the order of the universe itself (ibid. q. 103, a. 2, ad 3m), (3) that intellectual creatures, although governed [by divine providence] for their own sake, are nevertheless further ordered for the sake of the perfection of the universe which itself is ordered to God as its ultimate end (Summa contra Gentiles, 3, c. 112, ¶10, §2865), and (4) that the Incarnation of the Word is ordered to the restoration of the order of the universe (Summa theologiae, 3, q. 1, a. 3). (Fs)

673b Fourth, to set things in order is the work of wisdom. And so just as God grasps in his own essence the idea of the entire actually existing order in such a way as to have a proper knowledge of all things according to all their determinations and relations (Summa theologiae, 1, q. 15, a. 2 a), so likewise must God be said to grasp in his own essence the ideas of all possible orders with all their determinations; 'for divine wisdom comprehends absolutely all that God's power can do' (ibid. q. 25, a. 5 c). From this we may conclude that the divine goodness is so good as to be the principle and foundation of all good both actual and possible. (Fs)