Summa Blogologica - Question 6: The Goodness of God

Now we get to the good stuff. The previous Summa Blogologica posts were the roots, the foundation of the rest of the understanding of God and His nature. The rest is vital as well but now we get to learn about the love of God, the good of God, and more. All the things Christians say about God that matter.

The Summa Theologica Question 5 reasons with Goodness in General, now Question 6 answers the Goodness of God. I will include the objections given by Thomas Aquinas because they help unfold the understanding a little bit.

Here we go:

-------------------------------------------------------

Article 1 consists of whether God is good. The objections state that God cannot be good because (1) good belongs to things of order, species and order, to which God is not, and (2) God cannot be good because good is desirable but God is not desirable by all as all do not know God. The reply is that God is the first and final cause, and thus he is also the cause of goodness and all good comes from Him. Why is that? Remember in Question 5 we learned that anything that has being has goodness? Well if God created everything then all goodness comes from Him. The mode, species and order are found in the essence of the cause, God is the cause. One does not need to know God as Himself, but can have natural knowledge of divine intelligence, and also all things seek their own perfection (goodness) and subtly seek God in this way.

Article 2 consists of whether God is the supreme good. The objections state that God is not the absolute good because, (1) supreme good adds something to good, but God has nothing added to him (he is not a compound being) but is simple, (2 & 3) to say God is the supreme good is to say there are other good things, but “God alone is good”. The reply to these is that the good between God and man are not univocal, that is, they are not the same thing. As creatures, we only “have” this good as imparted from the creator and is therefore limited, but God is not. God is the good - it is His very nature to be good, and not have good like us.

Article 3 consists of whether to be essentially good belongs to God alone. We know that, as all good comes from God, we must remember that God is His essence and anything coming from His emanation into thing is only possesses that thing which in this case is goodness; we have good, God is good.

Article 4 consist of whether all things are good by the divine goodness. God caused the goodness in things, and creatures are therefore good by reason of the divine goodness.

----------------------------------------------------------

Simple? What you need to know is in Articles 1, 3 and 4. What we must understand is essence/nature. For lack of easier terms, essence is nature, and they are what a thing is. We are human and so we have a human nature which has attributes. God does not have a nature, He is His nature. That is everything in understanding God. Because He is the cause of things, and nothing causes Him, He just is - period. .

Therefore, in the case of Goodness, we know that God does not have goodness, but is Goodness. The Goodness in the world is an effect of His act and will.

God - Is - Good . Its not just a nice thing we say to complement Him Questions? Comments? Gripes?