vol III Development:

Chapter 2: Model

page 1: God

We set out in this chapter of the site to construct a formal model of God. My ancestral God reached its highest theoretical expression in the Summa Theologiae of Thomas Aquinas, written 1265-1272. This God began its career in the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh. Aquinas, complete works in Latin, Miles, Jewish Publication Society

As Miles explains, the Hebrews last heard from their God in the Book of Job. This book is an ancient literary masterpiece (circa 500 bce) that questions the authenticity of the Hebrew God. Their hardships had shown the Hebrews that it was an open question whether they were under the effective protection of a loving and omnipotent deity or not. Yahweh - Wikipedia, Job.

The Hebrew God was revived by Christianity. A new, humanized interpretation of the rather remote God Yahweh of the Hebrews appeared. God became human in the form of Jesus of Nazareth. This is explained in the Christian part of the Bible, the New Testament, which is the definitive literary record of the Incarnation and its effects upon humanity. As well as becoming human, God also appears in the New Testament as a Trinity of persons each with a particular role in the support of Christian churches. Incarnation - Wikipedia,

Aquinas created a synthesis of Christian ideas and the natural science and philosophy of his day that remains official in the Catholic Church. His mature writing on the existence and nature of God is contained in the part 1 of the Summa Theologiae. Code of Canon Law, 252:3, qq 2-43

Aquinas established the existence of God from the premiss that the world is not capable of explaining itself. This premiss was in turn justified by the metaphysical doctrine of potency and act that Aquinas had derived from Aristotle. Summa, I:2:3

So, although the Christian God is, through the Incarnation, much closer to us than the Hebrew God, it remains separate from the Universe and invisible to us.

The natural next step is to make God and the Universe one. Whether this is formally feasible depends upon finding a suitable model of God. We can do it if a model can be found that fits both our ideas of God and our experience of the world. This would serve to heal the rift between God and the world documented in Job. Instead of learning about the nature of God from ancient records, we expand our channel of communication with God to the totality of human experience. Scientific theology becomes possible.

(revised 13 August 2014)

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Further reading

Books

Click on the "Amazon" link below each book entry to see details of a book (and possibly buy it!)

Augustine, Saint, and Edmond Hill (Introduction, translation and notes), and John E Rotelle (editor), The Trinity, New City Press 1991 Written 399 - 419: De Trinitate is a radical restatement, defence and development of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. Augistine's book has served as a foundation for most subsequent work, particularly that of Thomas Aquinas.   Amazon   back

Canon Law Society of America, Holy See, Code of Canon Law: Latin-English Edition, Canon Law Society of America 1984 Pope John Paul XXXIII announced his decision to reform the existing corpus of canonical legislation on 25 January 1959. Pope John Paul II ordered the promulgation of the revised Code of Canon law on the same day in 1983. The latin text is definitive. This English translation has been approved by the Canonical Affairs Committee of the [US] National Conference of Catholic Bishops in October 1983.  Amazon   back

Jewish Publication Society, and (editor), Hebrew-English Tanakh, Jewish Publication Society 2001 'The JPS Hebrew-English TANAKH features the oldest-known complete Hebrew version of the Holy Scriptures, side by side with JPS’s renowned English translation. . . . The Hebrew text of this TANAKH is based on the famed Leningrad Codex, the Masoretic text traceable to Aaron Ben Moses ben-Asher, ca. 930 CE. . . . The English text in this TANAKH is a slightly updated version of the acclaimed 1985 JPS translation. . . . This edition also includes an informative preface that discusses the history of Bible translation, focusing on the latest JPS English translation of the Holy Scriptures. It is the result of a 30-year interdenominational collaboration of eminent Jewish Bible scholars.'   Amazon   back

Job, The Book of Job in The Jerusalem Bible, Darton Longman and Todd 1966 Introduction: 'The Book of Job is the literary masterpiece of the [Biblical] Wisdom movement. . . . The author of the Book of Job . . . is without doubt an Israelite, brought up on the works of the prophets and the teachings of the sages. . . . The writer puts the case of the good man who suffers. This is a paradox for the conservative view then prevalent that a man's actions are rewarded or punished here on earth.' (pp 726, 727)  Amazon   back

Miles, Jack, God : A Biography, Vintage Books 1996 Jacket: 'Jack Miles's remarkable work examines the hero of the Old Testament ... from his first appearance as Creator to his last as Ancient of Days. ... We see God torn by conflicting urges. To his own sorrow, he is by turns destructive and creative, vain and modest, subtle and naive, ruthless and tender, lawful and lawless, powerful yet powerless, omniscient and blind.'  Amazon   back

Pais, Abraham, 'Subtle is the Lord...': The Science and Life of Albert Einstein, Oxford UP 1982 Jacket: In this ... major work Abraham Pais, himself an eminent physicist who worked alongside Einstein in the post-war years, traces the development of Einstein's entire ouvre. ... Running through the book is a completely non-scientific biography ... including many letters which appear in English for the first time, as well as other information not published before.'  Amazon   back

Links

Aquinas 11, Summa: I 2 1: Is the existence of god known of itself? , 'Now because we do not know the essence of God, the proposition is not self-evident to us; but needs to be demonstrated by things that are more known to us, though less known in their nature--namely, by effects.' back

Aquinas 13, Summa: I 2 3: Whether God exists?, I answer that the existence of God can be proved in five ways. The first and more manifest way is the argument from motion. . . . The second way is from the nature of the efficient cause. . . . The third way is taken from possibility and necessity . . . The fourth way is taken from the gradation to be found in things. . . . The fifth way is taken from the governance of the world. back

Aquinas 14, Summa: I 3 1: Is God a body? , 'I answer that, It is absolutely true that God is not a body; and this can be shown in three ways. First, because no body is in motion unless it be put in motion, as is evident from induction. Now it has been already proved (2, 3), that God is the First Mover, and is Himself unmoved. Therefore it is clear that God is not a body. .. .' back

Aquinas 160, Summa: I 27 1 Is there procession in God?, 'Our Lord says, "From God I proceeded" (Jn. 8:42).' back

Aquinas 35, Summa: I 7 1 Is God infinite?, 'Since therefore the divine being is not a being received in anything, but He is His own subsistent being . . . it is clear that God Himself is infinite and perfect.' back

Aristotle - Metaphysics, Internet Classics Archive | Metaphysics by Aristotle, 'ALL men by nature desire to know. An indication of this is the delight we take in our senses; for even apart from their usefulness they are loved for themselves; and above all others the sense of sight. For not only with a view to action, but even when we are not going to do anything, we prefer seeing (one might say) to everything else. The reason is that this, most of all the senses, makes us know and brings to light many differences between things. ' back

Church Fathers - Wikipedia, Church Fathers - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were early and influential theologians, eminent Christian teachers and great bishops. Their scholarly works were used as a precedent for centuries to come (see Proto-orthodox Christianity). The term was used of writers and teachers of the Church, not necessarily "saints", though most are honoured as saints in the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox Churches, as well as in some other Christian groups; notably, the heretics Origen and Tertullian (as described hereinbelow) are generally reckoned as Church Fathers.' back

First Council of Nicea - Wikipedia, First Council of Nicea - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The First Council of Nicaea was a council of Christian bishops convened in Nicaea in Bithynia (present-day İznik in Turkey) by the Roman Emperor Constantine I in A.D. 325. The Council was the first effort to attain consensus in the church through an assembly representing all of Christendom.' back

Fundación Tomás de Aquino, Corpus Thomisticum, The Corpus Thomisticum project aims to provide scholars with a set of instruments of research on Thomas Aquinas, freely available via Internet. It has five parts: • A full edition of the complete works of St. Thomas according, where possible, to the best critical texts. • A bibliography covering all the studies on Aquinas and his doctrine, from the 13th century through our days. • An index of the main tools of Thomistic research, and the edition of the most important among them. • A database management system, implemented to search, compare, and sort words, phrases, quotations, similitudes, correlations, and statistical information. • A digital edition of the main manuscripts of Aquinas' works. back

Gospel - Wikipedia, Gospel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A gospel is an account, often written, that describes the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In a more general sense the term "gospel" may refer to the good news message of the New Testament. It is primarily used in reference to the four canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. However, the term is also used to refer to the apocryphal gospels, the non-canonical gospels, the Jewish gospels and the gnostic gospels.' back

Gospel, John, John 1:14 , 'The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. back

Holy See, Code of Canon Law: Canon 252 para. 3, '§3. There are to be classes in dogmatic theology, always grounded in the written word of God together with sacred tradition; through these, students are to learn to penetrate more intimately the mysteries of salvation, especially with St. Thomas as a teacher. There are also to be classes in moral and pastoral theology, canon law, liturgy, ecclesiastical history, and other auxiliary and special disciplines, according to the norm of the prescripts of the program of priestly formation.' back

Incarnation - Wikipedia, Incarnation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Incarnation literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh. It refers to the conception and birth of a sentient creature (generally a human) who is the material manifestation of an entity, god or force whose original nature is immaterial. In its religious context the word is used to mean the descent from Heaven of a god, or divine being in human/animal form on Earth.' back

Measurement in quantum mechanics - Wikipedia, Measurement in quantum mechanics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The framework of quantum mechanics requires a careful definition of measurement. The issue of measurement lies at the heart of the problem of the interpretation of quantum mechanics, for which there is currently no consensus.' back

Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Thomas Aquinas: The medieval theological classic online : 'Because the doctor of Catholic truth ought not only to teach the proficient, but also to instruct beginners (according to the Apostle: As unto little ones in Christ, I gave you milk to drink, not meat -- 1 Cor. 3:1-2), we purpose in this book to treat of whatever belongs to the Christian religion, in such a way as may tend to the instruction of beginners. We have considered that students in this doctrine have not seldom been hampered by what they have found written by other authors, partly on account of the multiplication of useless questions, articles, and arguments, partly also because those things that are needful for them to know are not taught according to the order of the subject matter, but according as the plan of the book might require, or the occasion of the argument offer, partly, too, because frequent repetition brought weariness and confusion to the minds of readers.' back

Trinity - Wikipedia, Trinity - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons or hypostases:[1] the Father, the Son (Jesus), and the Holy Spirit; "one God in three persons". The three persons are distinct, yet are one "substance, essence or nature".[2] A nature is what one is, while a person is who one is.[3][4][5] The Trinity is considered to be a mystery of Christian faith.' back

Yahweh - Wikipedia, Yahweh - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Yahweh (. . . Hebrew: יהוה‎), was the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel and Judah. The name may have originated as an epithet of the god El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon ("El who is present, who makes himself manifest"),[1] and appears to have been unique to Israel and Judah,[2] although Yahweh may have been worshiped south of the Dead Sea at least three centuries before the emergence of Israel (the Kenite hypothesis). The earliest reference to a deity called "Yahweh" appears in Egyptian texts of the 13th century BC that place him among the Shasu-Bedu of southern Transjordan,' back