Tertia Pars
Lecture 59: Christ's Subjection to the Father: Nature and Person

Transcript
================================================================================

with him in regard to the Father. And Tom's going to divide that, right? Kind of interesting division there. Interesting. Then we're not to consider, look at the premium now at the beginning of chapter 20. Then we're not to consider about those things which belong to Christ in comparison to the Father, of which some are said of him according to his relation to the Father, that he is subject to him, right? And that he prays, right? That's kind of interesting. I often notice that when I read the Latin there. When we use the word pray, we have to put a preposition there, right? I don't pray God, do you? No. I pray to God, right? Or I pray to Mary or somebody, right? Okay. But that's all in one word there in the Latin. Okay. Second, that he prayed. And third, that he ministered to him in, what? Priesthood. So you rather Christ there, you better see what that is going to be about, huh? And whether he's going to the Kisadak, right? And so on, huh? Okay. The pray there, that's often used in Shakespeare's type English. Mm-hmm. I pray you this. Mm-hmm. St. Thomas More uses that all the time. Yeah. He reads some of his letters. Yeah. So he mentions three things there, right? And some things are said, or can be said, according to the relation of the Father to him, right? To it, if the Father adopted him, right? And that he predestined him, right? So he puts these two into a question, huh? Questions with five, huh? Five parts. First, therefore, we're not to consider about the subjection of Christ to the Father. Secondly, about his prayer, right? That's the next question, point one. Third, about his, what? Priesthood, right? Those three that are said then of Christ in reference to the Father. And then the two, right? Of the Father towards the Son. Fourth, about whether adoption belongs to him, right? I can see the problem there, baby. And fifth, about his, what? Predestined, huh? Okay. So that's going to take us up to about, what? To 24, right? And then in question 25, we'll begin the third part of this, right? Those things are pertained to Christ in comparison to us. So, again, you have basically a division into three, right? Christ in himself, and then Christ towards the Father, and then Christ towards us. Now, about the first, there's two questions, just two articles in this question, 20, huh? Whether Christ is subject to the Father, and whether he's subject to himself. I do it all the time. I do it all the time. To the first, one proceeds thus. It seems that it should not be said that Christ is subject to the Father. Okay, I think I'd agree with Thomas. He's going to take the opposite side, I assume, of that, right? And it is. For everything that is subject to God the Father is a, what? A creature. Because, as is said in the book about ecclesiastical dogmas, in the Trinity, nothing is, what? Serving nor subject. But it should not be said simply, without qualification, that Christ is a creature. Therefore, it ought not to be said simply that Christ is subject to God the Father. Well, that's a pretty good song, yeah. Moreover, from this, something is said to be subject to God, that it is subservient, right, to his dominion, yeah. But to the human nature in Christ cannot be attributed service, or slavehood or something. It may be stronger. It can be weaker or stronger. For Damascene says in the third book, it should be known that neither, what? Yeah. Are we able to say that, what? Slave, the human nature of Christ, he's talking about when he says this. For servitude and lordship, the name are not, what? Yeah. Are not names or knowledges of nature, but of those things that are towards something, as are fatherhood and, what? Sonhood. Therefore, Christ, according to his human nature, is not subject to, what? God, the father. Moreover, 1 Corinthians 15, it is said, when all things are subject to him, then the son himself will be subject to the one who subjects to himself all things. But, as is said in Hebrews 2, 8, now it is what? Do we see that to him are subject to all things? Therefore, not yet is he subject to the father, who subjects to himself all things. He doesn't subject himself to the father, apparently, from this quote, right? And to all things are subject to him. And they're not all subject to him yet. That's all I was quoting. The Lord said to my Lord, I said to my right hand, to my grandmyself, let's do it. It's not quite yet than me, right? Okay. But against this is what is said in John chapter 14. The father is greater than me. And Augustine says in the first book of the Trinity, not unreasonably right does Scripture say both, that the son is equal to the father and the father is greater than the son. For that is said according to what the form of God is divine nature. This is an account of the form of a, what? Servant. It's understood without any confusion of these two natures. Okay. But the lesser is subject to the greater. Therefore, Christ, according to the form of a servant, is subject to the, what? Father, huh? Now, what is Thomas going to say about this, huh? It's quite interesting what he comes up with, huh? I answer it should be said that to anyone having some nature belongs those things which are appropriate to that nature or which are proper to, in the sense of being, you know, belonging to that nature. But human nature from its condition has the threefold subjection to God. I didn't realize how subject I was to him, huh? You realize that? One, according to the, what? Grade of goodness, huh? Insofar as the divine nature is the very essence of goodness, huh? Is goodness itself. This is clear through Dionysius in the first chapter of the divine names. Yes, he begins with the name good, huh? But the created nature has a certain partaking of the divine goodness, huh? As it were subject to the, what? Rays of that, what? Goodness, huh? Like the emotions are subject to reason because they partake of reason or when they partake of reason. Thomas is saying, I was looking at his commentary on John this morning and he's talking about the, in the Latin, the regulus, right? who has. Who has. The son, I guess it is, the son who is sick, right, he wants Christ to come, and Christ doesn't go, but he does cure the son, right, and Thomas is talking to the spiritual senses of this, right, he says, when your reason rules the rest of you as it should, it's a king. But when it doesn't completely rule them, and they're sick, as it were, then it's like the regulars, right, like this servant, you have reason, but imperfectly, right, and this is part of the spiritual meaning here, right, that he's not ruling the way he should himself, it's interesting, I think Shakespeare used the word king or even queen that way, you know. That the one who really has their passions under their reason is like a king or a queen, you know, depending on whether he's talking to me or a female, but I think I've seen that in Shakespeare, it just kind of reminds me of it. Secondly, human nature is subject to God as regards the, what, power of God, right, insofar as human nature, just as any creature, is subject to the operation of the divine disposition. And a third way, especially human nature, is subject to God through its own, what, act, insofar as by its own will, it obeys his, what, commands. And this threefold subjection to the Father, Christ, what, confesses about himself. First, Matthew, huh, it's interesting to take that text, I knew he was going to take that text. Why do you call, or why do you ask me about good, right? One is good, namely God, right? When Thomas comes in that passage, he says, because God is good as itself. Well, that's why he says, only God is good, right? Why call me good, right? Because he put himself under God, right? That first, that first sense, right? When Jerome says, because, huh, he called the, what? Good teacher. Yeah, good, right? And not God, or the Son of God, confessed. He says that although he is a holy man, in comparison to God, he is, what? Not good. Not good, huh? There's Plato there in the symposium, right, when he gets to the higher love matters, right? And then he has his ascent to God, the beautiful itself, right? And God is beauty itself, you could say, right? And, you know, if you say that, you know, in comparison to God, we are non-beings, right? Maybe even the saints in comparison to God could be called ugly, right? Maybe it's a little hyperbole, I don't know, but I mean, give the distance there, right? Don't call me beautiful, right? By which he gives us to understand that he, according to his human nature, right, does not arrive at the grade of divine goodness. That's an awfully strong way of saying that my goodness is not, what? Equal to the goodness of God, right, huh? And because in those things which are not great, by a, what? Quantity. Quantity. The same it is to be, what? Greater to be better. As Augustine says in the sixth book of Trinity. From this, or by this reason, or for this reason, the Father said to be greater than Christ according to his, what? Human nature, huh? Secondly, the subjection is attributed to Christ insofar as all things which are done about the humanity of Christ, we believe, were, what? Done by divine, what? Disposition, right? Didn't have his own life, right? That's just what God had proclaimed for him to do. Whence Dionysius says in the fourth chapter of the shohararchy that Christ is subject to the orderings of God the Father, right? And this is the subjection of servitude according as every creature serves God being subject to his, what? Ordering. According to that of wisdom, book of wisdom, chapter 16, huh? The creature is serving to his, what? Maker. And according to this, also, the Son of God is said to be taking on the form of a, what? Servant, yeah. Form, as it were, of a creature, right? Okay. Third, the third subjection is attributed to himself, attributes to himself, saying, what are pleasing to him, I do always, right? And this is the subjection of, what? Obedience, huh? Whence it is said in Philippians chapter 2, that he was made obedient to the Father, we'll square more to him, right? Even to death, huh? Death on the cross. That's interesting, huh? He'd probably come up with one way of being subject, and Thomas comes up with three ways of being subject, and showing then that Christ is subject as man, in all three of these ways, to the, what? And show that by Christ's own words. Yeah. So you say the argument from authority is the strongest in theology? You know, the first objection was saying, well, we're not supposed to say that Christ was simply a, what, creature, right? To the first therefore it should be said, that just as it should not be understood simply that Christ is a creature, but only according to his, what, human nature, huh? When you speak of Christ, you're talking about the person, right? The person is not a creature, right? So you don't say that, without qualification, that he's a, what, creature, but according to his human nature, he's a creature. Whether this be added to him as a determination or not, as has been said above, so also it should not be simply understood that Christ is subject to the Father, but only according to his human nature is he subject to the Father. Otherwise you'd say no person was subject to him, right? Even if this determination is not always added, right? Which, however, more suitably should be added to avoid the Arab Arius, huh? Who posited the son less than the father, right? So Thomas has an objection in there because of an important point he wants to make, right? In answer to the, what, misuse of that by the Arians, right? You've got to be kind of careful there, right? Say simply without qualification, he's simply to the Father, then you're going to say simply without qualification, he's less than the Father, right? And yet, he's equal to the Father, too. Okay, now let's look at a second objection here again, yeah. I guess if I get the objection correct, he's saying that you apply this to the person, not to the nature, right? It's your father or son or master or servant, right? To the second should be said that the relation of servitude and dominion are founded upon action and passion, acting upon undergoing, insofar as, what, belongs to the servant to be moved by the Lord, huh? By the command of the Lord, right? Now, to act or to do something is not attributed to nature as to the one doing it, right? But to the person is the famous thing in philosophy. That acts are the supposita and the singular supposita, according to the what? The philosopher. Who is that guy in the way? But there is attributed the action of nature. It's attributed action to nature as to that by which the person of the hypostasis acts. Just like you might say, you know, is it my mind that understands or is it me that understands? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Does my will love or do I love by my will? Does my stomach digest my food or do I do it? The point is that you don't have to think about it. You don't have to think about it, but you will think about it. You don't have to. And therefore, although not properly as it said, that nature is a lord or a servant, right? Nevertheless, it can probably be said that some hypostasis or person is a lord or servant, according to this or that what? But nature. And according to this, nothing prevents Christ to be said to be subject to the father or a servant according to his human nature, right? The same we might say that we rule over the beast, right? And why do we rule over the beast? Well, it's by our nature, you might say, right? To an extent, human nature rules over the nature of the beast, right? But the beast, by his nature, is the servant of man, the horse, right? It should be. And man, by his nature, should rule over the beast, huh? One of Obama's czars thinks that the animal should be right to be represented in court, right? Well, the next time he has a court case, we'll have a cow represented in the defendant's case. When you're going to kill the cow for meat, right? The cow should have a right to be represented by some defendants. Now, the third argument is saying that Christ is going to turn over and be subject to the father when everything else is subject to him. That's a culmination, right? This is not true yet. To the third, it should be said, as Augustine says in the first book of the Trinity, Then Christ will hand over the kingdom to God and the father, when the just, in whom now he rules by what? Faith, are brought to the division, right? To the species, right? To the form of God. That they see the very common essence, the essence common to the father and the son. They see God as he is. And then he will be totally subject to the father, not only in himself, but also in his members. That's kind of a subtle thing here. Through the full partaking of the divine goodness. Then also all things will be fully subject to him by the final fulfilling of his will about them. Although, even now, all things are subject to him as regards his, what? Power, right? According to that of Matthew 28, there is given to me all power in heaven and on earth. Since he's saying that Christ, as an individual man, right, is completely subject to the father now, right? But Christ as mystical body will be completely subject to the father later on when we all, when mystical body, see him as he is face to face. Now, whether Christ is... Subi to himself, well this is kind of a strange thing, but I remember we were seeing this in Kajetan one time, you know, talking about I forget some part of the Sumi you know, but it's the feeling that Thomas determines everything, formally. Formality. He divides things up, right? We were saying that about the reason, I remember I was saying it last time, wasn't I, that in the ability to look before and after is included the ability to look for what? Distinctions, right? If anybody looks for distinctions and sees distinctions, it's Thomas Aquinas, right? In some place I forget now, right, it's in Aristotle where he says most men are not good at seeing distinctions. You see it all the time in the newspaper and they'll make fundamental distinctions, I see them. To the second one proceeds thus it seems that Christ is not subject to himself for Cyril says in his synodic epistle promises to the consul which the synod of Ephesus received, right? It's authoritative. He says, neither is Christ a what? Servant to himself, nor is he what? Lord. For it is foolish, right? More so, impious to thus say or to what? Think, yeah. And this also, Damascene asserts in the third book saying the one being Christ cannot be a servant of himself and lord of himself, right? Sounds like a what? Contradiction, huh? There's a couple big big, big names here, huh? He ever seems always to have, you know, difficult memories than that. Seriously. Seriously. But to that extent he is said to be the what? Servant of the father insofar as he's subject to him. Therefore Christ is not subject to himself, right? Moreover, service is said in reference to the lord, right? to the master. But there's not a relation of something to itself. Prince Hillary says in the book of the Trinity that nothing is like itself or equal to itself, right? When you say that Socrates is Socrates, Socrates is the same as Socrates, that's a relation of reason, huh? Because there really aren't two Socrates to be, what? The two would be related to each other. Bill Cosby had a joke when he was at his funeral he lost a plan when they put in the casket he's going to have it. Because he often hears this, he goes awakes and he says, I don't know if he would say, doesn't he look like himself? I'm going to have a tape recorder there with my voice. Don't I look like myself? Moreover, just as the reasonable soul and the flesh are one man, right? So God and the man are one, what? Christ, as Athanasius says, but a man is not said to be subject to himself or a servant of himself or greater than himself on account of the fact that his body is subject to his, what? So, therefore neither should Christ be said to be subject to himself on account of this that his humanity is subject to his, divinity. But against this is what Augustine says in the first book about the divinity. Truth shows, according to this way, in which the father is greater than Christ according to his human nature, that he's also less than himself. Moreover, as he himself argues, in the same place, thus is taken from the son of God the form of his servant or is taken on by the son of God the form of his servant that he does not lose the form of God, right? But according to the form of God, the nature of God, which is common to the father and the son, the father is greater than the son according to his human nature. Therefore, also the son is greater than himself according to his, what? Human nature. Moreover, Christ, according to his human nature, is the servant of God the father according to that of John chapter 20. I go up, I ascend to my father and your father, my God and your God. But whoever is a servant of the father is a servant of the son. Otherwise, not all things which are of the father would be of the son. Therefore, Christ is a servant of himself and subject to himself. So, what say you? He's going to reply very briefly to the Adalia too. I answer it should be said, that it has been said, to be lord or master and servant is a tribute to a person or a hypostasis according to some, what, nature. Since therefore, Christ is said to be, when therefore, Christ is said to be the lord or servant of himself or the, what, the son of God or the word of God is the lord of the man Christ, this can be understood in, what, two ways. In one way, that this be understood to be said by reason of another, hypostasis or person, right, as if other is the person of the word of God lording it over and the other of the man serving. And this pertains to the heresy of Nestorius. When some condemnation of Nestorius, it is said in the synod of Ephesus, if someone says that God or the Lord, that the word, right, God or is the Lord of the, of what, Christ, the word that is from God the Father, right, and not the same, and does not confess the same, rather, is to be at once, both, what, God and man, as the word made flesh, according to scriptures, let him be accursed. This is an anathema, means. And in this way, it is negated or denied by Cyril and, what, Damascene. And under this same sense, it should be denied that Christ is less than himself, or that he is, what, subject to himself. There's not one person in Christ subject to another person in Christ, right? In another way, it can be understood according to the diversity of natures in the one person or hypostasis. And thus, we are able to say, according to one of them, in which he agrees or comes together with the Father, together he with the Father, right, is, to be before and to dominate, right? And according to the other nature in which he comes together with us, he is under, to be under, and to serve. And according to this way, Augustine says that the Son is less than himself, right? Okay, now Tom's going to give a little more caution here. It should be known, however, that since this name Christ is the name of the, what, a person, just as this name Son, right? Those things, per se and absolutely, right, are able to be said of Christ, which belong to him by reason of his person, which is eternal, right? And most of all, those relations means, which more properly seem to pertain to the person of hypostasis. But those things which belong to him according to human nature, more should be attributed to him with a determination. We've talked about that kind of distinction before, right? Simply, not to say simplicity, it's a kundum quid, huh? Sometimes simply and not simply, right, huh? Which is also the name of one of the, what, kinds of fallacies, right? The mistake for mixing up what is so simply with what is not so simply, right? You've heard me talk about that in, like, the meaning of Plato, right? Can you go looking for what you don't know? Yeah. You say, well, we're paying all these guys to find the cure for cancer or something else, right? So you're paying them to look for what they don't know. Well, along comes our friend Muni. He says, how can you look for what you don't know? You don't know what you're looking for. What's the answer to that? Yeah. But simply, you don't know it, right? If you didn't know it in some way, you couldn't, what, direct your thinking towards it, huh? That's a very common mistake, right? You used to tell the students, you know, I know this distinction is hard to get a hold of, but your life is based upon this because you're always doing something bad, simply speaking, because it's good in some way. Or you're not doing something good for you to do, like study this course, because in some way it's, what, bad. So we're making that kind of mistake in our deity actions all the time, huh? Aristotle says in the ethics, right, that the evil man, the bad man, right, is mistaken. He thinks that what is bad is, what, good, and what is good is bad, right? He's making that kind of a, what, mistake, yeah. It's a very common thing, huh? And it's the, it's, it's the second kind of mistake outside of speech, right? First one is a mistake of the accidental one, which deceives even the wise, as Aristotle says. Very strong way of speaking. Then the second kind of mistake, huh? Mixing up what is so, simply what is not so simply. And Aristotle comes back to that, that thing that we know there at the beginning of the posture analytics that he talks about. Are coming to know what we don't know through what we do know. But, you know, the thing that's interesting is that when Socrates tries to answer Meno's objection, right, he makes the same kind of mistake. And did Plato do that on purpose, right? You know, Thomas says, you know, that Plato and Aristotle are the chief philosophers, the principal ones. And they both seem to have arrived at some knowledge of God, right? Aristotle perhaps more perfectly than Plato, but he has some of that, right? And you see that, and I can suppose in there, you know, the ascent to the beautiful itself, right? You know, you have to really admire Plato as well as Aristotle. And Plato's dialogues, and they have a lot to be said for them. But those things which belong to him according to human nature should be attributed to him, cum determinazione, right? So the qualification, that, for example, we say Christ simply is, what, maximum, right? At dominum, at precedentem, reciting. That he is however subject or a servant or less with this determination. Secundum humanum natura, right? Human nature, huh? Now, sometimes I point to this thing that we do with names, where we tend to add something to the name to kind of make it for a child. And I knew the girl whose name was Annette. And as she got older, she didn't want to be called Annette because it meant like little Ann, you see? And that's why we call it Ann, right? So people started calling her Ann instead of Annette, you know? But you kind of add that qualification, that determination, and it kind of, what, diminishes it, right, huh? It's Jacob, or Jakey. One of the roses, his cousins there, his father's named Charles, and he was named Charles. So when he was living, he was always a freak of Charlie boy. But even when he was grown and had married and had children, he's still called Charlie boy. He could never quite escape that, right? So he's Charlie, but qualified, you know? Or if I say you're a mannequin, you know, you're a little man, right? Okay. So that's the way he understands the Cyril and Damascene, right, huh? They deny Christ is, what, Lord of himself, according as to this is implied, a plurality of, what, supposita, or hypostasis, or persons, right? Which is required that someone be, what, simplicitary, the Lord of another, right, huh? Okay. So we'd say that Christ, we wouldn't say that simply Christ is the Lord of himself, or simply Christ is the servant of himself, right? In some way he is, according to his, what, human nature, yeah. Okay, to the second it should be said, huh? That simply it is necessary to be other the Lord and the servant, huh? But it is possible for some notion of, what, lordship and servitude, right, to be observed insofar as one is Lord of himself, according to other another, right? Okay, okay. Now, you know, see, is that not just invention of Thomas, I mean, you can say, I think it's something like self-control, right, huh? Let me say somebody lacks self-control or he has self-control, and, you know, is the controller and the controller the same? Yeah, yeah. So, one part of you is controlling the other, right, and therefore you're said to have self-control, right? So it's something like this, in a way, you know. Can I control myself? You know? Control yourself, you say to somebody sometime, you know? Get in charge of yourself. Yeah. Yeah. So it's not these ways of speaking are, you know, not used, huh? People don't realize sometimes, you know, when you meet distinction, people say, well, yeah, that's an odd way of speaking, but then they themselves speak their way sometimes without realizing it, right? See? In a sense of making a distinction, right? So are you in control of yourself in the same way you might be in control of your children? Well, yeah. There's something like this there, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was mentioning this text there where, I was reading in John this morning, in fact, where, you know, when reason rules, you know, the emotions and they obey reason, then reason is like the king, right? You see? And that's where he's speaking in front of Shakespeare's plays, too, as I mentioned. Okay. Now, to the third objection here. To the third, it should be said that on account of the diverse parts of man, one of whom is above another below, right? The philosopher says in the fifth book of the Nicomachean Ethics that there is justice of man to himself, right? Insofar as these two kinds of emotions, the irascible and the inquisible, obey what? Reason, huh? And according to this way, one man can be said to be what? About subject and servant according to diverse parts, right? Why can't we say this in Christ according to diverse natures, right? Now, to the other arguments, he says, is clear the response from what has been said. For Augustine asserts that the Son is less than himself or subject to himself according to his human nature, right? Not according to a diversity of what? I suppose we tell, right? Cyril is a big hero for the Ravocytes, actually, because he was countering the stories of the Ravocytes. He was counteracting various stories. But then he went through it. Yeah, yeah. It's like those scenes of Augustine. He gets more precise in the time of Augustine as he goes on. He gets more precise when he talks about grace and distinctions. I was looking at this article there in the questions disputate potency there about who the relations of Father and Son in the Trinity are real relations, right? Of course, Thomas is going to defend them as being real relations. But the first objection is a text, I think, from Damacy, which is a little bit implicit in its language, right? And Thomas, you know, explains it, I think, you know. You've got to be careful, you know. Yeah, yeah. But as Job says, Veribis in Orinati Prolates. Heresy. No. I don't know. What do you mean? The one that you always quoted? Well, the Orthodox faith, that word, is by him, isn't it, as far as I know? Yes. I thought that was, I haven't even said anything like that, so I don't have a comment. Yeah. But I was thinking it was just a compilation of different other people, and so I thought that maybe when you said the same thing, maybe it's, uh... Oh, maybe so, but... I mean, of course, I'll be honest. He should say. Okay. Okay. Now we get to the, I think, more interesting thing, the prayer of Christ, right? I know, isn't the gospel of the day there that you went up and prayed all night, it said? Thank you. You're God. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Did you have Simon and Jude yesterday, or everybody? No, no. We have a whole different year. A whole year of feasts. Some feasts are in common, but... I almost got out the root prayer game, you know. When the kids were little, we had a thing on our Feast of the Apostle, we have root prayer floats. Oh, man. Which I particularly like, you know. So, either generosity or willing to share with it. Yeah. I think it's marriage, root prayer and root prayer, and they're just, they're made for each other, you know. And, uh, so... So, uh... I almost got to root prayer yesterday, and it wasn't that way. We'll have to remind Brother Patrick of that now. Whenever there's a piece of the Apostle, we root beer float. How good of Simon and Jude is he had one on one day. And we have them different days, so... Yeah, yeah. That's unfortunate. I don't know too much about those people. I don't know about the Catholic encyclopedia there. They didn't seem to have too much on those guys, Simon and Jude. But there's kind of a controversy why he's called the zealot, right? Some want to say he belongs to this party of the Pharisees, and others say, no, he was very zealous in the faith. Okay, then we'll have to consider about the prayer. We'll go on? We'll take a break? I don't think we'll break. Take a break now? Before it begins. Okay. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. We'll be right back.