Theological Research ■ volume 2 (2014) number 1 ■ p. 31–52
Giulio Maspero
Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, Rome
Life as Relation:
Classical Metaphysics
and Trinitarian Ontology
Abstract
Life is a theological and metaphysical problem, because it constitutes the apex
of the realm of being. The Aristotelian Unmoved Mover was identified with
Life as the act of thinking. Christian doctrine affirms that God is triune just as
Life, but here identified both with Logos and Love. The ontology of the First
Principle is different in Classical metaphysics and in Trinitarian theology. The
question discussed in the paper is how this difference affects the understanding of the relationship between God and the world. Having recourse to the
theological framework developed by the Cappadocian Fathers in the discussions that lead to the formulation of the Trinitarian dogma in the 4th century,
free and mutual relation is presented as the key concept that was used in theology to overcome the limitations of the metaphysics of the time and to extend
it in order to develop a new ontology that is an ontology of life. Trinitarian
ontology may also aid our understanding of created life, because it is not simply meta-physics, i.e. a description of man and God according to the category
of necessity, but is ana-physics: life is understood from above with suitable categories for free beings.
Keywords
Gregory of Nyssa, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, metaphysics and trinitarian
theology
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And all other realities will appear immaterial and unnecessary, save this
one: father, son and love. In that instant, gazing at the simplest of realities, we shall all say: was it not perhaps possible to decipher this long
ago? Has it not been ever-present at the foundation of all that is?
(Karol Wojtyla, Rays of Fatherhood)
Introduction
J. Daniélou wrote, “The real metaphysical questions are those which
reveal the limits of metaphysics.”1 Life does, in fact, seem to be one of
these very questions that poses a challenge for human thought. Certainly religion has always been connected to life and its limits, which
refer to the sacred dimension: one thinks, for example, of the religious
value of the beginning, the end, and the transmission of life found in
every ancient culture. The phenomenological perception of the finiteness of one’s own life and the necessity for a source that is identified
with the fullness of life itself begs for God.
In this paper we analyze the relationship between life and the first
principle, dealing with some fundamental factors in the development
of philosophical and theological thought, in an attempt to gather how
a Trinitarian revelation permits us to reach a new ontological conception capable of overcoming some difficulties that have emerged
throughout the course of history. The key to this transition has been
the discovery of the ontological value of the will and of relation.
The analysis begins with the Greek philosophical thought of Plato
and Aristotle, in order to then show how the Church Fathers in the
fourth century extended the concept of classical metaphysics, according to a model that was later fixed in the synthesis of Aquinas in the
Medieval Period. The conclusion of this narrative is a proposal for an
ontological re-examination of the notion of life based on those categories developed within human thought by its reflection on Trinitarian
revelation.2
1
2
J. Daniélou, Dieu et nous, Paris 1956, p. 65.
For this particular work there have been many important discussions with professor Ariberto Acerbi of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross (Rome) and with
professor Riccardo Chiaradonna of RomaTre University (Rome).
Life as Relation…
Classical Metaphysics
In Plato’s ontological hierarchy Eros serves as an intermediary uniting the universe.3 This mythical figure is clearly a reference to life, in
all its immediate anthropological and religious resonances. Within the
context of the Symposium Eros is again tied to authentic life: it is, in
fact, defined as the tendency to engender and give birth to what is in the
beautiful in order to reach eternity.4
The relation between ontology and life is therefore intrinsic to the
metaphysical understanding of reality. Generation and the tendency
towards fullness of life are included in the structure of being in all its
gradations. One may wonder if the connection between being and life
also applies to the zenith of the ontological spectrum. Clearly, the generative dimension cannot be extended to the perfect World of Forms,
but it is extremely interesting to find Plato address life within this
realm.
In Laws he presents a magnificent line of reasoning that ends with
the pre-existence of the soul and its primacy over the body. Classifying the different movements, he demonstrates how the chain of those
things that move and are moved must be preceded by something that
moves by itself, without receiving motion from others.5 And this is precisely what is identified with life and the soul.6
This doctrine unfolds a genuine evolution in the theological thought
of Plato: while in Phaedo he represents the World of Forms in a static
way, in Sophist, one of his last works immediately preceding Laws, this
vision of the World of Forms is modified, attributing movement, life,
soul, and intelligence to it (κίνησιν καὶ ζωὴν καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ φρόνησιν).
Certainly this dynamic is related to thinking, inasmuch as the Forms
are subject to knowing and being known.7 In this way, the maturity of
Platonic thought reveals a close connection between life and the ontological foundation.
This construction is perfected by Aristotle who, by means of the
metaphysical instrument of the act, comes to identify God with the
3
4
5
6
7
Cf. Plato, Symposium, 202e, 1–7.
Plato, Symposium, 206.e; see also 208.ab.
Cfr. Plato, Laws, 894.e.
Cfr. Plato, Laws, 895.ce.
Cfr. Plato, Sofist, 248.e – 249.a.
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Giulio Maspero
act of living and thinking. Similarly to Plato’s analysis,8 Aristotle, beginning from the constant circular movement of primordial heaven,
returns to the necessity of some reality that may be the cause of this
motion. But the reality that moves because it is moved is recognized
as an intermediary (μέσον), which necessarily appeals to an ultimate
reality that moves without being moved (ἔστι τι ὃ οὐ κινούμενον κινεῖ),
insofar as it is eternal, and simultaneously, substance and act (ἀΐδιον καὶ
οὐσία καὶ ἐνέργεια οὖσα).9
The Prime Mover must be the final cause of each and every thing.
It is highly desirable because it is pure act and pure thought. Hence, it
does not communicate movement in that it is moved, as is true of the
rest of reality, but because it is attractive as far as it is loved and desired
(κινεῖ δὴ ὡς ἐρώμενον͵ κινούμενα δὲ τἆλλα κινεῖ).10 The use of the verb
ἐράω is extremely significant, because it calls to mind the Platonic reflection on Eros.
Aristotle arrives at the apex of his reflection in the moment he presents the Prime Mover as life, similar to that which for human beings is,
though for a brief time, the most elevated:
If, then, the happiness God always enjoys is as great as that which we
enjoy sometimes, it is marvelous; and if it is greater, this is still more
marvelous. Nevertheless it is so. Moreover, life belongs to God (καὶ ζωὴ
δέ γε ὑπάρχει). For the actuality of thought is life (γὰρ νοῦ ἐνέργεια
ζωή), and God is that actuality; and the essential actuality of God is life
most good and eternal (ἐνέργεια δὲ ἡ καθ αὑτὴν ἐκείνου ζωὴ ἀρίστη
καὶ ἀΐδιος). We hold, then, that God is a living being, eternal, most
good (φαμὲν δὴ τὸν θεὸν εἶναι ζῷον ἀΐδιον ἄριστον); and therefore life
and a continuous eternal existence belong to God; for that is what God
(ὁ θεός) is.11
This passage contains striking beauty: E. Berti appropriately underscores the fact that only at the end of the argument is the name of God
8 Beyond the Laws, Plato a similar construction in Lysis, where he demonstrates
the existence of a First Friend (πρῶτον φίλον), from whom descends every friendship
and attraction (cf. Plato, Lysis, 219.d).
9 Aristotle, Metaphysics, XII, 7:1072.a.21–26.
10 Aristotle, Metaphysics, 1072.b.1–4.
11 Aristotle, Metaphysics, 1072.b.24–30.
Life as Relation…
(ὁ θεός) introduced.12 It ought to be stressed how Aristotle tries to lead
human contemplation to that act which is divine life. The theological
claim is of enormous significance, so much as to constitute, perhaps,
the extreme limit to which one can elevate human reason deprived
of revelation. The beauty of intellectual contemplation allows one to
reach God who is alive inasmuch as he thinks, identifying himself with
thought itself. In this way, Aristotelian ontology is presented as an ontology of life that is an ontology of thought.13
Simultaneously, this apex also represents a limit, because the fullness of life is identified with the necessary dimension, which explicitly
excludes relation and the will.14 Aristotle’s God is pure act and therefore
can desire nothing and cannot relate to anything: simply put, insofar
as he is absolute, God is not concerned with the concrete individual.15
Life is always interpreted according to the dynamic of necessity. At the
same time the identification of the first principle with life and thought
is placed at the base of every ulterior metaphysical reflection of reality.
Thus, summarizing the contributions of Greek reflections concerning God and life, one can say that:
12 Cf. E. Berti, “Per i viventi l’essere è il vivere” (Aristotle, De anima 415.b.13), in:
M. Sánchez Sorondo (ed.), La vita, Roma 1998, p. 29.
13 Cf. E. Berti, “Per i viventi l’essere è il vivere”..., p. 30.
14 Enrico Berti instead maintains that the Aristotelian first mover is a person,
understood in the sense of the subject that is capable of intending and desiring within
Roman law. The attribution of the will would be demonstrated by the fact that for
the first principle the act is pleasure (ἡδονή), from which one would deduce the presence of will (cf. E. Berti, Attualità dell’eredità di Aristotele, PATH 5 (2006) p.302–305).
Here there seems to be an interpretation of intellectual pleasure as will that cannot be
completely shared because it applies to the first principle the category of ὄρεξις, which
Aristotle strictly uses in anthropological contexts. As well known, psychological theory
of Aristotle represents a significant progress with respect to Plato (cf. A. Bausola, La
libertà, Brescia 1990, pp. 57–59). Nevertheless, the application of the analysis of pleasure
and desire to the first principle was not developed by Aristotle and seems impossible
to identify it with pure act. It also seems improper to attribute personage to the Aristotelian first principle by virtue of the identification of traditional Greek deities with
the various movers: the gods themselves, in fact, are none other than mythological
personifications of natural forces, that pertain to the realm of necessity. It seems anachronistic to read Aristotle’s texts with an ontological conception of the person and the
will. The same could be said for the platonic demiurge or every other ancient, mythical
personification of the divine.
15
We refer to the affirmations of Giovanni Reale in G. Reale, Metafisica di
Aristotele, Milano 2004, p. cxxiv.
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Both Plato and Aristotle start from a metaphysical conception constituted by a continuous ontological scale that combines the world and its
first principle in a single order.
Plato is perfected by Aristotle: the former, at the end of his work, introduces life and thought in the theory of Forms and Ideas, the latter
identifies the Prime Mover as the act of life and thought.
Both confirm thought as the ultimate metaphysical dimension of the
first principle’s life.
Greek metaphysics pulls together, therefore, the connection between being and life at the level of the first principle, identifying the
fullness of life with thought. The intelligible, in fact, does not pass away,
but survives within the material and phenomenological dimension. But
this thought is strictly related to the necessary causal connections that
rule the cosmos and are extended to the single ontological order that
includes the first principle and the world.
Trinitarian Ontology
Christian thought made Greek metaphysical thought its own, but at
the same time required modification. The encounter with God urges
one to wonder w h a t this being i s that speaks and acts in history.
And this is a metaphysical question, as is the question w h a t Jesus
i s. The Cross itself shows that those who crucified Christ understood
that this new rabbi claimed to be God: the very cause of the Cross was
the answer to such a metaphysical question. In this sense, the use of
metaphysics was imposed by the search for the meaning of Scripture.
Yet, the necessity of uniting the question of w h a t to the question
of w h o emerged. The first Christian thinkers were forced to face the
paradox of receiving the answer before the question. At this point one
may open to the fact that Jesus is one with the Father (see John 10:30)
though he is also distinct from Him, because in addition to the dimension of essence comes the dimension of the person. However, this
demands an extension of classical metaphysics, which always relegated
the w h o to the accidental and phenomenal level.
Already in the Old Testament one observes this insufficiency, because God is shown as having a will and entering into relations in a way
that exceeded the limits of classical philosophy, born from a reflection
Life as Relation…
on the cosmos and necessity of nature. One could no longer find a mere
cosmic and necessary foundation of what is beyond physical reality
(μετὰ τὰ φυσικὰ). In fact, the Creator reveals himself over and beyond
nature, giving origin to all things out of nothing, for the sake of love,
and is in ever-present contact with human beings. This entering into
a relationship with God pushes itself, then, to the extreme point of the
Incarnation. So, with the revelation of the New Testament one discovers that God not only h a s relation, but also is identified as three
Persons all uniquely themselves within their reciprocal relations. In the
same way one discovers that God thinks not only of himself, but also
thinks about and loves everything in existence, human beings in particular who are created in His image and likeness. Finally, the God of
the New Testament is not only seen to have a will, a will of love, as in
the Old Covenant, but is identified with the will itself, as it is stated
that “God is Love” (1 John 4:8).
The history of the development of Trinitarian doctrine can be revisited precisely as the slow and laborious self-development of this new
ontology, no longer merely a metaphysical theory. Access to being and
its foundation can now be given only in the relationship and the gift
that God offers to humanity. With respect to the Greeks, the identification of the divine life with thought alone had to be revised: the Greek
ontological scale, in fact, implied that the first principle could have
been known from the bottom up by means of human reasoning. God’s
relation to the world was a necessary causal relationship that could be
traced by the mind of philosophers all the way up to the various levels
of being. The Creator God of the Bible could still be known in this
way, although only a posteriori, insofar as this God is the origin and end
of the cosmos. However, within his own personal dimension he could
only be known by way of his self-revelation. The journey is merely the
freedom of love with which He discloses his immanence. In order to
know God, not only thought but also the will becomes essential: the
will of God who gives himself and the will of the man who opens himself to this gift. The distance between the creature and the Creator can
be traversed only if the Creator himself desires it and then opens himself to the creature. So the concept of the logos is re-examined and extended in a personal sense: while the Greek logos is identified precisely
with the necessary causal link that connects the different levels of that
single ontological scale intended to be between God and the world, the
Christian Logos is the gift of the Father – the free and personal Word
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Giulio Maspero
in the New Testament is indeed the Word, the Person of the eternal
Son. To think of the triune God becomes impossible except from the
starting point of Christ, from the Logos made flesh.
Thus, the transition to this new ontology can be identified in the
formulation of a new thought not solely based on a logos ut ratio, that
is a logos understood as a necessary causal link, but as a thought that
is born out of the logos ut relatio, that is, from the thought of the Son
whose being is a purely ontological relation with the Father.16 Initially,
the Trinitarian theology of the third century was influenced by the
metaphysical conception of the logos, finding it difficult to express the
complete identity of nature and dignity between the Father and the
Son. The identification of the second Person with the eternal Logos, the
thought of God, always refers to the creation and the causal link with
it, because in the philosophical tradition the Logos assumed the function of ontological mediation that united in a necessary way the various
planes of being. But this implied an ontological difference with respect
to the first Person, in such a way as to induce a subordination (at least
verbal) of the Son to the Father. The Son ran the risk of being identified
with the Platonic Eros or one of the Aristotelian intermediate movers,
by influence of the graduated Neo-Platonic theology.
This difficulty was not overcome until the fourth century, with the
thought of Athanasius and later the Cappadocians. In this context, the
relation between God and the world was no longer expressed through
the ontological mediation of the Logos, but with the new instrument of
the theology of nature: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit were
identified with the single, eternal, and uncreated nature, while all other
existing natures were recognized as ontologically dependent on this
first nature. Between God and the world opened an infinite gap, which
could not be overcome by any degree of ontological intermediary. This
allowed for the expression of the creative and redemptive act in terms
of love and freedom, placing the divine will in the first order and recognizing its ontological density. Hence, an ontology arose that had to
acknowledge the relation and the will within the first principle. The
concept of life also had to adjust accordingly.
16 Cfr. G. Maspero, Patristic Trinitarian Ontology, in: G. Maspero, R. J. Wozniak
(eds.), Rethinking Trinitarian Theology: Disputed Questions And Contemporary Issues in
Trinitarian Theology, London–New York 2011.
Life as Relation…
Gregory of Nyssa
The novelty of this idea is quite clear in the theology of Gregory of Nyssa.
His reflection on the Trinity develops at the end of the Arian crisis, containing his central point in the interpretation of the God from God formula derived from Nicea. His reply to Eunomius required a refinement
of conceptual instruments, a true and proper extension of metaphysics
and classical gnoseology. The Nicean formula was understood, Arianism
aside, as a confirmation of the subordination of the Son with respect to
the Father, because the being from someone implied not being original
and therefore being metaphysically inferior. The central point was therefore to identify the ontological value of generation. The Christian first
principle is Trinitarian and contains in itself not only the life of thought,
but also the life communicated in a total way from the Father to the Son
in generation. Their relation is not merely a causal connection in which
the Second necessarily depends on the First as the effect of the cause:
the Father does not generate the Son merely giving him some thing, but
gives him all of Himself. For this the Son is one with the Father. The Father, then, generates the Son in the total gift of that full and eternal Life
that is the very being of God. And the Son is the perfect image of the
Father precisely in the re-giving of Himself to the Father, in such a way
that the Father is Father in the Son and the Son is Son in the Father in
their mutual relation of pure, reciprocal, and absolute gift.
The being from is revisited from the perspective of absolute life that
gives and generates, a life that is reciprocal relation. Being in classical
metaphysics, that in its absolute form cannot admit prepositions (grammatical signs of relations), must be reformulated in an ontology that includes the relations themselves within the first principle. As an example
of this, Gregory of Nyssa’s Contra Eunomium III might be of some help.
The work was finished between 381 and 383, immediately after the Council of Constantinople17 and presents the theological questions treated as
the correct hermeneutics of the Nicene True God from true God (θεὸν
ἀληθινὸν τὸν ἐκ τοῦ ἀληθινοῦ θεοῦ).18 For Eunomius, in fact, generation
17 Cf. J. I. Ruiz Aldaz, article Contra Eunomium III, in: L. F. Mateo-Seco,
G. Maspero, The Brill Dictionary of Gregory of Nyssa, Leuven 2010, pp. 307–310.
18 The Nicene formula in Contra Eunomium III appears explicitly in 1,65,12 (GNO
II, 27,3) and in 1,85,9–10 (GNO II, 33,15–16), in this case accompanied by light from light
(φῶς ἐκ φωτός͵ θεὸς ἀληθινὸς ἐκ θεοῦ ἀληθινοῦ).
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Giulio Maspero
implied a substantial difference, through which the generated substance
could not be the same substance as that not generated.19 From this perspective the procession was read as proof of the subordination.
Gregory, then, presents the first principle as possessing some immanence, an in-side. It is precisely this dimension, expressed by the preposition in, that obliges one to claim the substantial identity between the
first two divine Persons, because, as is written in John 1:18, the Son is in
the bosom of the Father:
The Father is principle (ἀρχή) of all things. But it is proclaimed that
the Son is also in this principle (ἐν τῇ ἀρχῇ ταύτῃ), since he is by nature
that which the principle is. In fact, God is principle and the Word that
is in the (first) principle (ἐν τῇ ἀρχῇ) is God.20
If the second Person is inside the first, it cannot then be something
else with respect to that Person. In this way the Son is not Himself
a different ontological principle with respect to the Father and cannot
be understood as an effect, but is entirely in the original ἀρχή. Hence,
the Son identifies Himself with Life, and with all other divine attributes, just like the Father is God precisely because He identifies Himself with Life:
Godhead is essentially Life (αὐτοζωή), and the Begotten God is God
and Life, and Truth and every conceivable thing that is sublime and
God-befitting.21
This means that the second Person of the Trinity is Life from Life
with respect to the first Person. This formula is used by Gregory explicitly in Contra Eunomium III, together with Light from Light and God
from God.22 The expressions of the Nicene Symbol are then read in light
of the claim that the true Life is that of the Father and the Son, that is,
true Life includes generation.23
19
20
21
22
Cf. Contra Eunomium III, 1,67: GNO II, 27,21–28,6.
Contra Eunomium III, 6,22,1–4: GNO II, 193, 23–26.
Contra Eunomium III, 6,75,1–3: GNO II, 212,15–18.
Cf. Contra Eunomium III, 8,57,1–58,3: GNO II, 260, 12–22. One can also see
a similar context: Contra Eunomium I, 1,688,1–8: GNO I, 223,27–224,5.
23 This is in stark contrast with how the platonic Eros is viewed and within
the entirety of the Aristotelian and Neo-Platonic traditions, that always understand
Life as Relation…
This statement would not be possible without introducing a new
ontology and modifying the Greek metaphysics on one essential point,
the point that Eunomius denies by citing relation and generation as
proof of subordination. Gregory’s basis for the position he takes is
Scripture, specifically the exegesis of John’s prologue, where the Evangelist writes:
that the Word was God, and was Light, and was Life (cf. John 1:1–4),
not merely being in the beginning and with God and in the bosom of
the Father, in such a way that by this kind of qualification the Lord is
deprived of being in the strict sense. By saying that he was God, he cuts
off every way round for those whose minds are running into wickedness, and furthermore, even more important, he proves the evil intent
of our opponents. For if they claim that being in something (τὸ ἔν τινι
εἶναι) is a sign of not strictly being, they surely agree that the Father
also strictly is not, since they learn from the Gospel that as the Son is in
the Father, so too the Father is in the Son, according to what the Lord
says ( John 14:10). To say that the Father is in the Son, is the same as
saying that the Son is in the bosom of the Father.24
In the first place, Gregory accepts as a hypothesis Eunomius’ claim
that the being accompanied by prepositions, that is relative being,
would indicate a metaphysical inferiority. He opposes this with the fact
that John does not merely say that the Logos was in relation to the
Father, as prepositions would express, but claims that Logos is God,
Light and Life in an absolute sense, adding nothing more. This would
indicate that Eunomius’ objection is unfounded. The reply does not
end here, but follows with an attack on the metaphysical premise itself,
checkmating his opponent. In fact, if being in relation were to exclude
absolute being, then not even the Father would be God in an absolute
way, because in John 14:10 it is written that the Father is in the Son.
The expression “being in something” (τὸ ἔν τινι εἶναι) has fundamental
value in classical metaphysics, because it indicates accidental being that
must inhere in some substance and cannot subsist on its own.
This ontological extension also manifests itself in the reexamination
of the role of the will. Regarding the Greek tendency to equate will
generation as degeneration.
24 Gregory of Nyssa, Contra Eunomium III, 8,40,11–41,6: GNO II, 253,25–254,11.
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and desire to thought, as is evident in Plato’s Symposium and in Socratic
ethics, Gregory of Nyssa inverts this relation and places the will itself in
the ἀρχή to explain the relation between the Father and the Son:
The Father wanted something, and the Son who is in the Father, had
the same will as the Father, or better yet, he himself has become the
Will of the Father.25
The being of the Son is the doing of the Father’s will, “wanting”
to be from Him, that is, accepting and completely giving back the divine being to the First Person in an eternal exchange of reciprocal gift
through which each Person is God not alone, but in relation with the
two other Persons.
Augustine and Aquinas
The discovery of the ontological value of relation and will allows for
the re-examination of the identification of life and being, in such a way
as to place freedom and love as the foundation of being itself. The essential step for the development of Trinitarian doctrine in the fourth
century was the distinction between two different ontological levels:
that of the world and that of the Trinity. Classical metaphysics was
developed from the point of view of the former, but now, because of
Revelation, a new ontological plane can be accessed by human knowledge, albeit only in part. This plane is characterized by the possibility
of perfect identity between the single substance and three divine Persons, a modality that is impossible to achieve on a creaturely level. The
“giving Life” in divinis does not imply losing it: rather, being consists
precisely in the giving of oneself.
This new outcome had to have an effect on the ontological comprehension of creation as well, and more specifically for what concerns human beings created in the image and likeness of the Creator
(Gen 1:26). Clearly, the distance between the two ontologies remains
necessarily absolute, but what had been discovered as the perfection
of divine being could not exist in an equivocal way in creation as imperfection. For example, being in relation realizes itself in an absolute
25 Idem, Contra Eunomium II, 1, 216, 1–2: GNO I, 288, 17–19.
Life as Relation…
and perfect way in God, and therefore cannot correspond in human
beings to something that is not a perfection. Rather, the perfection
of the human being must pass precisely through his or her own relations, and through communion. The same can be said for some of the
virtues that were not recognized as such by pagan ethics, like humility, whose ultimate foundation is the Trinitarian being one in the other.
Lastly, the will becomes discovered in all its ontological depth that allows for the real union between lover and beloved. Here the difference
between knowing and wanting is emphasized: while one might know
bad things without becoming bad himself, wanting implies a transformation of the one who wants in the act of wanting, by which one
actually becomes that which he desires. From this breakthrough the
entire ontology of love is born.
All this was made manifest, then, in the identification of divine life
not only with the act of thinking, but now also with that of wanting
(or desiring). It is precisely this distinction between the two ontologies
that permits Augustine to develop his psychological analogy. This does
not consist in the projection of an anthropology within divine immanence, but rather recognizes in the being of God Himself, disclosed by
Revelation, the ultimate source of an anthropological element that ancient philosophy was unable to fully appreciate. Specifically, in describing the triad memory, intelligence and will in human beings, Augustine
demonstrates how these might be a single life:
Since, then, these three, memory, understanding, will, are not three lives, but one life; nor three minds, but one mind; it follows certainly that
neither are they three substances, but one substance. Since memory,
which is called life, and mind, and substance, is so called in respect to
itself; but it is called memory, relative to something. And I should say
the same also of understanding and of will, since they are called understanding and will relatively to something; but each in respect to itself is
life, and mind, and essence. And hence these three are one, in that they
are one life, one mind, one essence; and whatever else they are severally
called in respect to themselves, they are called also together, not plurally, but in the singular number. But they are three, in that wherein they
are mutually referred to each other.26
26 Augustine, The Trinity, X, 11, 18.
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Immediately after presenting life of the human spirit as a unity
within a trinity, Augustine traces all of this back to the Trinity itself as
the foundation of being.27 In this way all the components of the new
ontology emerge: relation and the addition of the will alongside the
intellect, from which the former can be distinguished only in a relational sense.
The psychological analogy then reveals itself as a consequence of
the new ontology elaborated to present the distinction in the one and
triune God not substantially, but relationally. In this way the theology
of the Logos of the first three centuries can be read as an incomplete
psychological analogy, that little by little perfected itself according to
the continuous deepening of the orthodox theological comprehension
of life at the human level and in God, parallel to the development of
this new ontology.
After the passing of centuries, in the Golden Age of Scholasticism,
Aquinas comes to the formulation of the psychological analogy in the
context of an extensive theological system with particular coherence.
In the Disputed Questions on Divine Power, recovering the outline of
the Greek analysis of the movement, he reconnects the procession of
the Son and the Spirit to the claim that God is alive. In the body of
the first article of the tenth question, he draws the line between two
kinds of operations: those that emanate from the agent to a different
object or the external realm and are common both to living and nonliving things, and those operations which are immanent and proper
only to living beings. The analysis moves from Aristotelian psychology
to affirm that immanent operations are not a sign of imperfection, but
rather characterize the act of a perfect being. In fact, Life would consist
of the capacity to move oneself, according to all that Plato claimed.
Aquinas, however, completely detaches himself from the Greek analysis when he adds the immanent operation of love that proceeds from
the lover to the word that proceeds from he who speaks. God is said to
be living precisely because He possesses the immanent operations of
the intellect and will, without which he would not be perfect. In fact,
with regard to immanent operations Aquinas writes:
We attribute another kind of operation to God insofar as we speak of
him as understanding and willing. For he would not be perfect if he
27 Cfr. Augustine, The Trinity, X, 12, 29.
Life as Relation…
did not exist in an act of understanding and willing. In this way we
acknowledge him to be a Living Being.28
So, for Aquinas to say that God is Life is the same as saying that
God is triune, because the Life most ontologically elevated, the source
of every other life, is that which consists of two processions. The divine
Persons are numbered to be three, among themselves distinct but identical to a single substance, precisely because God is intellect and will, in
such a way that the two immanent processions relationally differentiate
the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Aquinas, at the end of the corpus in
question, explicitly reconnects himself to the Greek theology developed in the fourth century in order to respond to the Arians, whose
theology would imply a God dead and void of intelligence.
In this first article of the tenth question, Aquinas develops the
thought of Augustine, who was very clear in warning that the psychological analogy could not be understood as an explanation of the
Trinity,29 making explicit note of the identity between the claim that
God is living and that God is triune. This has become possible precisely because the history of salvation has revealed the divine act in history
as pure gift, from which proceeds the value of the will and relation. The
descending Judeo-Christian model, derived from the establishment of
God’s love as the source of human life, supplants the ascending Greek
model that is based on geometric and necessary proportion. The absolute disproportion of the gift received by the divine will replaces
ontological necessity.30 This implies that the will and love are read in
the light of an absolute gift and no longer in the Greek terms of desire
and attraction.
28 Thomas Aquinas, Disputed Questions Concerning Divine Power, q. 10, a. 1, co.
29 Augustine, The Trinity, XV, 7, 11; 22, 42; 23, 43.
30 This point reconnects to the apophatic dimension of theology, that characterizes the pinnacle of thought from the Cappadocians until Aquinas through the mediation of Pseudo-Dionysius: the role of the will within creation introduces, in fact,
a discontinuity in the necessary chain of causes, whereby the same transcendence
freely operates as the direct principle cause irreducible to the other. In this way, human thought can no longer trace back to penetrate the being of God, but not taking
as a starting point the divine act in history, to arrive at the personal dimension starting
from the connection between being and act. In this way, the same apophaticism marks
the limit of philosophical reflection, which cannot penetrate the strictly Trinitarian
dimension.
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All of this leads one to think that the psychological analogy is
never at risk of being interpreted as some kind of protection on the
basis of human categories in God, insofar as the historical analysis
suggests that this full recognition of the ontological statute of the will
might be the fruit of Revelation, and concretely from the discovery of
God as the Trinity. At the same time, the development of Trinitarian
thought from Augustine to Aquinas shows how the identification of
God and Life is accomplished in the affirmation of the Trinitarian
dimension, tied to the comprehension of the ontological density of
the will and relation.
Anaphysics and Metanthropics
A sentence from Etienne Gilson, that has attracted the attention of
Y. Congar, J. Daniélou, and G. Lafont, seems perfect to conclude this
journey: “Metaphysical theories grow old because of their physics.”31
This shows that metaphysics is necessarily connected to that physics
starting from which one pursues the ontological foundation of reality.
Classical metaphysics has succeeded in drawing together a reflection
on God and life, identifying, in the work of Aristotle, life itself with
thought. Tracing the various causal links, the human being reaches
a first principle that is a universal and necessary thought. The limit
of this endeavor is the capacity to give value to the concrete and the
individual. The same Greek tragedy gives evidence to the difficulty of
preserving the life of the individual in the face of universal value.
The development of the Trinitarian doctrine, from the fourth century until Aquinas, demonstrates how Christian thought has had to push
the boundaries of the classical metaphysical concept, to make sense of
the one and triune God who is relation and enters into relation. Revelation has provided access to a new ontology that characterizes the
first principle alone and sets it apart from the ontology of creation. The
Aristotelian first mover and the world belonged to a single metaphysical order that philosophical thought could explore. On the contrary,
one can only know the ontology of God through that which has been
revealed. So one discovers the value of the will and relation, deeply
31 “C’est par leur physique que les métaphysiques viellissent,” quoted in G. Lafont, Peut-on connaitre Dieu en Jésus-Christ?, Paris 1969, p. 10.
Life as Relation…
connected to each other: the distinction between the necessary Greek
causal connection and Christian relation is properly given by freedom
and the reciprocity that characterizes the latter within the new ontological conception.
The Trinitarian doctrine can then be defined as ana-physics, which
is an extension of meta-physics: while the Greeks sought an ontological
foundation starting with physical and cosmic reality, viz. out of necessity, Christian thought must describe an ontology that is not simply
beyond (meta-) the physical realities, but is above (ana-) them. This
ontology finds its foundation above, not below. It is precisely this anaphysics that allows for a treatment of life that is able to take into account
the fact of relation and freedom.
The phenomenon of life in this way stresses the limits of classical
metaphysics, because it has been developed from the point of view of
a cosmos where the individual does not have absolute worth, but only
the universal enjoys ontological priority. In this sense, the single basis
of life can be the thinking thought of the First Mover, that moves all
things as a necessary cause, but has relation to nothing. It is a life that
is purely intellectual and not in any way relational, a life that knows
nothing of the gift or will.
Christian thought, on the other hand, has had to gather the ontological priority not only of thought, but also of the will, with respect to
the cosmos: the world is wanted and loved by God. The ultimate reason
is love, and therefore freedom.
These categories of relation, gift and love may also be utilized
within the ambit of creation to develop an ontology that seeks after
the foundation of being starting from those realities that are essential
to the human being. This is, in fact, the image and likeness of the
Creator and the ontological structure of the human being must bear
the sign of those perfections that are uncovered through ana-physics.
For example, if God’s immanence can only be known through free
self-revealing, this would allow one to gather the existence of an analogical dimension of self revelation in the knowledge of the personal
immanence of the human being, leading one then to recognize the
value of revelation and faith on a purely human level, regardless of
faith. According to the Greeks, faith was merely an inferior mode
of knowing, to be followed solely when science was impossible. But
now, faith and the opening of oneself become the highest vertices of
knowledge, insofar as they are personal.
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A similar ontology could be defined, then, as meta-anthropics, because it seeks the ontological foundation not claiming a necessary or
fixed cosmos as a prototype. Rather, it takes off from freedom, relation,
and gift. From μετὰ τὰ φυσικὰ one would pass to μετὰ τὰ ἀνθρωπικὰ.
This does not negate nor undermine metaphysics. The human being
does not cease to be physical or obey the necessary laws of the cosmos.
But the proper categories of true life, that is, of thought and love, assume a new value for each and every human being. They are ontologically capable of providing a foundation for morality and are not merely
aprioristic and voluntaristic. From this perspective, measureless love,
even giving one’s life for an enemy, does not represent a loss but a gain
in that Being properly consists in relation.
Even physics is re-examined, starting from the notion of gift and
every thing is recognized as the word of God, a word of love. The
meaning of all reality becomes the Son and the Gift. This opens the
way to a new ontological dimension that recognizes not only the necessary cause, but also the free cause. The one and triune God need
not be autarkic to maintain His primacy, but is God precisely in His
absolute openness to relation. In the Greek world desire was seen
as deprivation, and therefore could not be attributed to God; in the
Christian world desire is the desire of self-donation and therefore
supremely divine.
This new conception of the divine changes the way to read the
finite world: precisely because created ontology subsists in the relation with what is not created, its finiteness is relation to an infinite
Creator. The creaturely limit becomes an opening to the infinite in
the relational cross-reference to God who gives Himself, creating
without losing anything of Himself and without confusing Himself
with His creation. The relational ontology makes it possible to comprehend how God would have no need of “protecting Himself,” but
can be absolutely transcendent, also making Himself truly present in
the world.
From this perspective relation should not be understood according to the classical metaphysical model, where it takes on the role of
an accident, but starts from its new ontological dimension revealed
by God. The life of human beings can only be fully understood from
above: and gazing vertically from the Trinity towards human beings
one may find the instruments that would then permit us to understand
human beings horizontally in all their value. Within God, relation is
Life as Relation…
characterized by absolute freedom32 of the mutual and divine self-gift,
without that kind of necessity typical of the causal effects in creation.
Relation in God is not thought alone but also will. For this reason the
two processions follow a double “movement” of flow and reflow parallel to that of intellect and will. The knower in a movement of attraction
grasps the known, and the lover is united to the beloved in an ecstatic
movement. This is how the Father generates the Son, his Logos, and
this generation is inseparable from spiration by which the Lover and
the Loved – that is, the Generator and the Generated – are united in
Love: the Holy Spirit.
It is a matter, therefore, of grasping how father, son and love could
be terms of truly ontological value, since the same Ipse Esse Subsistens
is Father, Son and Love. For theological imagery, then, at the created
level, filiation and paternity cannot be read as mere accidents, but possess unique ontological density.33 Through this filiation the essence of
human beings can be re-examined. In the same way, interpersonal relations can be re-examined not strictly from a moral or psychological
perspective, but from the very same being. Sociology also follows this
path when it demands a new metaphysical conception that could recognize the familial reality.34
This insufficient vision of the world based solely on essentialist
metaphysics is also noticeable in contemporary science. The mechanistic rationalism of classic mechanics went into crisis in view of the
radical, relational dimension brought to light by the discovery of chaos:
understanding the evolution of a minimally complex system, in fact,
requires that account be taken of the interactions of objects that are
on opposite sides of the planet. Further still, quantum mechanics has
32 Cf. J. Zizioulas, Trinitarian Freedom: is God Free in Trinitarian Life?, in:
G. Maspero, R. J. Wozniak (eds.), Rethinking Trinitarian Theology: Disputed Questions
And Contemporary Issues in Trinitarian Theology, London–New York 2011, zzzz.
33 From this ontological point of view one could recognize the metaphysical
value of the phenomenological analysis of the human psyche that, from the time of
S. Freud onwards, identifies the wounds of human filiation as the source of pathology:
cf. G. Maspero, Remarks on the Relevance of Gregory of Nyssa’s Trinitarian Doctrine for the
Epistemological Perspective of 20th Century Psychoanalysis, European Journal of Science
and Theology 6 (2010) pp. 17–31.
34 One may see an extremely interesting analysis in P. Donati, Relational Sociology. A New Paradigm for the Social Sciences, London–New York 2011, pp. 66–72.
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proven this relational structure:35 When one enters into the dimensions
of the studied phenomena, the same interaction of the measurement
placed in act from the knowing subject modifies the known object. Instead of a representation based on objects as different essences, one
must introduce a conception of reality as relations.36
This relational dimension grows as we approach the phenomenon
of life, where the complexity becomes essential to quantitatively analyze the phenomenon. Biological organicity is really an integrated
form of relatedness. But this process stops in the face of human life
characterized by freedom. The organic relation is, in fact, still marked
by necessity and the will is not brought into play. Life highlights the
category of relation in the description of reality and at the same time
shows the insufficiency of the category of relation understood solely as
a necessary interaction when we approach human life. This category of
relation developed by Trinitarian theology proves to be quite valuable,
even for those who do not share a perspective of faith. This contribution allows us to understand the value of the mutual and free relation
as the essence of man.
Conclusion
The phenomenon of life has a profound religious significance that
points to its relationship with the first principle. Classical metaphysics
approached it from the bottom up, by the search of a foundation to the
physical realities of the cosmos. Life has been identified with thought
and necessary causality as such. In this approach, however, the universal alone fails to take into account the individual and the person. This
raises the difficulty of studying life in this metaphysical perspective.
Trinitarian doctrine developed by the Church Fathers of the fourth
century can be recognized as a true and real ontology that offers thought
and conceptual tools capable of giving an account of life at the properly
human level, because they proceed from freedom. It is, therefore, not
35 This point has been noted by J. Ratzinger in 1968: cf. J. Ratzinger, Introduction
to Christianity, San Francisco 2004, pp. 173–177.
36 For an introduction of these two scientific theories markedly aware of the sensitiveness manifested here, see P. Musso, Science and the Idea of Reason, Milano–Udine
2011, pp. 351–405, 475–495.
Life as Relation…
a metaphysic, but an ana-physic. Starting from the relation of free and
mutual gift in God, one can then descend to man to define his life not
simply from the organic perspective. Very briefly, one could say that
the conquest of Greek metaphysics is the definition of life not only
through self-movement, but also through the capacity of thought, the
theoretical activity: starting from being alive because one moves, changes
to being alive because one reasons. This is an important gain, but will be
completed later thanks to Christian revelation when being alive because
one reasons is completed by being alive because one reasons and loves.
It is important to stress that this approach does not promote relation over substance: the ontology developed in the 4th century by the
Fathers of the Church in order to give an appropriate formulation to
the Trinitarian doctrine assigning the same fundamental role to both
the former and the latter.37
Moving from top to bottom, starting from this ontology discovered
by Trinitarian revelation, concepts and tools are found that may be applied also by those who do not share the faith to develop an ontology
that would not only be metaphysical, but could also be metanthropical, because it can account for those traits that are essential to human
life: freedom and love. If the anthropological instance in times past
has been expressed in an anti-metaphysical sense, perhaps it is because
there was no development of such an ontology.
Therefore, the Christian solution to the question about life and death
is not only a reference to thought and universal truth, as in Greece, but
is love: true life is being for another and in the other for love.
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