The Traditional Doctrine of Divine Simplicity

Traditionally God has been considered absolutely simple. Some contemporary philosophers argue that this means that God is His attributes and hence is mere quality, and that all the divine attributes name exactly the same quality, which is incoherent. However, the contemporary debate misunderstands the tradition. God is not quality, He is act. Analogies from human experience can minimize the initial implausibility. There are worrisome corollaries to this doctrine, the most troubling being that God's nature is somehow dependent on the choices of His free creatures. This conclusion, though radical, is not as shocking as it appears.

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The ‘Compatibilism’ of Human Freedom and Divine Omnipotence

Journal of Reformed Theology ◽

10.1163/15697312-01303019 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 13 (3-4) ◽

pp. 257-266

Author(s):

Wyatt Harris

Keyword(s):

Martin Luther ◽

Human Freedom ◽

Theological Method ◽

Divine Simplicity ◽

Divine Attributes ◽

Doctrine Of God ◽

Divine Omnipotence

Abstract Katherine Sonderegger’s doctrine of God, constructed on the basis of a meditation on the incommunicable divine attributes, is here elucidated. I detail Sonderegger’s commitment to divine simplicity and explain her preferred theological method: metaphysical compatibilism. I show how Sonderegger’s unique understanding of compatibilism allows her the freedom to bypass or displace most normative metaphysical arguments proffered by the tradition that attempt to elucidate divine and human freedom. Granting divine simplicity, thus that omnipotence is a moral doctrine, in other words, that omnipotence is good, I present Sonderegger’s notion of compatibilism in her account of Moses’ encounter with God at the burning bush in Exodus 3 and examine pertinent issues. A novel account of the nature of God is given that presents human freedom in a new light. By way of conclusion, Martin Luther is brought in to shed critical light on Sonderegger’s doctrine of God.

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Sobre la simplicidad divina y la predicación de múltiples atributos en Avicena y Tomás de Aquino / On Divine Simplicity and the Predication of Multiple Attributes in Avicenna and Thomas Aquinas

Revista Española de Filosofía Medieval ◽

10.21071/refime.v23i.8975 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 23 ◽

pp. 147

Author(s):

Luis Xavier LÓPEZ-FARJEAT

Keyword(s):

Thomas Aquinas ◽

Divine Simplicity ◽

Summa Theologiae ◽

Divine Attributes ◽

Multiple Attributes ◽

The Way

In In I Sent., d. 2, q. 1, aa. 1-3 Thomas Aquinas deals with divine simplicity and the predication of the divine attributes. There, he seems to take some distance from Avicenna, specifically when Avicenna avers that God lacks a quiddity. However, in the Summa theologiae Aquinas assumes, as he previously does both in In I Sent., d. 8, q. 1, a. 1 and in De ente et essentia, that there is an identity between the essentia/quiddity and the esse in God, while this statement would also be held by Avicenna. I will show how back to the Commentary on the Sentences Aquinas has detected the existing tension between the two thesis held by Avicenna, and I will also analyze the way in which he addresses both these theses.

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Divine Simplicity

Religious Studies ◽

10.1017/s0034412500014360 ◽

1982 ◽

Vol 18 (4) ◽

pp. 451-471 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

William E. Mann

Keyword(s):

Divine Simplicity ◽

Divine Attributes ◽

Divine Nature ◽

City Of God ◽

Critical Attention ◽

The City ◽

Detailed Presentation

In The City of God, XI, 10, St Augustine claims that the divine nature is simple because ‘it is what it has’ (quod habet hoc est). We may take this as a slogan for the Doctrine of Divine Simplicity (DDS), a doctrine which finds its way into orthodox medieval Christian theological speculation. Like the doctrine of God's timeless eternality, the DDS has seemed obvious and pious to many, and incoherent, misguided, and repugnant to others. Unlike the doctrine of God's timeless eternality, the DDS has received very little critical attention. The DDS did not originate with Augustine, but I am not primarily concerned with its pedigree. Nor am I concerned to ask how the doctrine interacts with trinitarian speculation. I will have my hands full as it is. In Section I of this paper I shall provide a rough characterization of the DDS, indicate its complexity, and focus on a particular aspect of the doctrine which will exercise us in the remainder of the paper, namely, the thesis that the divine attributes are all identical with each other and with God. In section n I shall discuss Alvin Plantinga's recent objections to Aquinas' version of the DDS. I shall then offer a more detailed presentation of what I take to be Aquinas' version (section III), and recast it in terms of a theory of attributes which is significantly different from Plantinga's (section IV). Although the recasting of the doctrine will enable me to rebut Plantinga's objections (section v), it by no means solves all the problems of the DDS. In section vi I shall discuss the chief lingering problem facing a defender of the DDS.

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Divine Simplicity and the Grammar of God-talk: Comments on Hughes, Tapp, and Schärtl

European Journal for Philosophy of Religion ◽

10.24204/ejpr.v10i2.2556 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 10 (2) ◽

pp. 89-104

Author(s):

Otto Muck SJ

Keyword(s):

Thomas Aquinas ◽

Divine Simplicity ◽

Divine Attributes ◽

Adequate Understanding ◽

First Cause ◽

Different Parts ◽

Simplicity Of God

Different opinions about the simplicity of God may be connected with different understandings of how abstract terms are used to name the properties which are affirmed of a being. If these terms are taken to signify parts of that being, this being is not a simple one. Thomas Aquinas, who attributes essence, existence and perfections to God, nevertheless thinks that these are not different parts of God. When essence, existence and perfections are attributed to God, they all denominate the same, the Being of the first cause. For Aquinas, this is a consequence of his way of introducing the language about God by basing it upon the philosophical ways leading to God as first cause. Awareness of this connection between Divine attributes and the arguments for God’s existence is crucial for an adequate understanding of Aquinas’ position.

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Truthmaking, resemblance, and divine simplicity

Religious Studies ◽

10.1017/s0034412521000123 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-17

Author(s):

Mahmoud Morvarid

Keyword(s):

Divine Simplicity ◽

Property A ◽

Traditional Doctrine

Abstract According to the traditional doctrine of divine simplicity, if an intrinsic predication of the form ‘God is F’ is true, then God's F-ness exists and is identical with God. To avoid the absurdity of identifying God with a property, a number of philosophers have proposed that God's F-ness should be interpreted, not as a property God possesses, but as the truthmaker for ‘God is F’, which is God himself. I shall argue that given some plausible assumptions, the truthmaker interpretation would undermine the highly plausible idea that there are ‘natural’ predicates which apply univocally or (at least) analogically to both God and some created beings. The only way in which the advocate of the truthmaker interpretation can avoid this problem is to embrace wholesale radical nominalism (with its own costs). That is to say, the truthmaker interpretation is far more constrained than it might initially appear to be.

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