Quidditative knowledge
| Latin | cognitio quiditativa; scientia quid est |
|---|---|
| Locus in Aquinas | Summa theologiae I, q. 12; q. 85, a. 5–6; q. 16, a. 2 |
| Branch | Philosophy of knowledge |
| Controlling authority | Catechism 39–43; Dei Filius; question 12 of the Prima pars |
| Doctrinal standing | God is not seen in essence in this life; quiddity as the proper object of intellect is Thomistic epistemology |
| School | Thomism |
Quidditative knowledge is, in Thomism, the intellect's grasp of what a thing is, the first and proper object of human understanding, which in this life does not attain the essence of God.[1]
What a thing is, before properties are composed
Summa theologiae I, question 85, article 5, describes the human intellect as first apprehending something about its object, such as its quiddity, which is its first and proper object, and then understanding properties, accidents, and relations by composition and division. Question 16, article 2, had already said that the intellect is true as regards what a thing is, as sense is true of its proper sensible, yet does not thereby know truth as known until it judges.[2][3]
Quidditative knowledge is therefore not an exhaustive inventory. It can be confused at first, as when animal is known before man is distinctly known. It can be analogical. It can be by effects. The school still calls it quidditative when the intellect attains the nature as nature, not merely a bundle of accidents. Error does not lie in the simple grasp of a simple quiddity, but in composing incompatible notes, as 'rational winged animal' applied as a definition.
God in this life: true knowledge without vision of the essence
Question 12 is the controlling theological use. Article 4 denies that any created intellect can see the divine essence by its natural power. Article 11 denies that vision of the essence belongs to this life. Article 12 allows that God is known by natural reason as cause, by way of eminence and negation. Catechism 39–43 receives this: our names attain God truly and remain analogical, forever surpassed. Dei Filius defined the natural knowability of God from creatures without claiming a quidditative vision.[1]
The blessed, by the light of glory, see the essence. Even they do not comprehend God, because a finite light cannot know the infinite as he is knowable. Quidditative knowledge of God in the strict sense of seeing what he is belongs to glory, not to pilgrimage. Faith is true knowledge of God, but it is of things unseen. The pilgrim does not already have the vision, and does not know nothing of God at all.[4]
Creatures: abstraction, not a scan of the innermost atom
Of material things, the intellect abstracts the specific nature from phantasms. That is quidditative knowledge in the connatural sense. It does not replace empirical investigation of properties. It is the grasp of what the thing is such that demonstration of properties can begin. A man may know what water is well enough to name it, and still have much to learn about its behavior. The quiddity is not a barcode hidden under the microscope.
Angels know quiddities more perfectly, without the discursive passage from potency to act that marks us. Human theology of the angels remains analogical. The point for anthropology is that our proper object is the quiddity of a material thing, and that from such things we rise to some knowledge of immaterial things, including God as cause. Question 84, article 1, had already saved natural science against a Platonism that would make bodies unknowable by intellect.[2]
School object under a defined limit
The Church defines that God is incomprehensible, that he is truly known, and that the blessed see him. She does not define 'quidditative' as a necessary word. Thomism uses it to keep two errors apart: a rationalism that claims to see God's essence by metaphysics, and an agnosticism that treats every divine name as empty. Aeterni Patris and Fides et Ratio commend the analogical middle.[5]
What a man is is known well enough to baptize him; God is not known as he knows himself; the blessed shall see him as he is. The Latin quid est is optional. The distinctions are not. Without some such grammar, either catechesis becomes a list of metaphors with no truth, or mystical claims of vision in this life overrun the difference between faith and glory.[6]
References
- Back to citation occurrence 1.0 Back to citation occurrence 1.1 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, question 12 — Primary treatment of how God is known by us, including the beatific vision, the limits of natural knowledge, and the denial of quidditative vision of God in this life.
- Back to citation occurrence 2.0 Back to citation occurrence 2.1 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, question 85, articles 1–2 — Primary analysis of abstraction from phantasms and of the intelligible species as that by which the intellect understands, not that which is primarily understood.
- Back to citation Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, question 16, articles 1–2 — Primary account of truth as conformity of intellect and thing, residing first in the intellect composing and dividing, and analogically in things as related to intellect.
- Back to citation First Vatican Council, Dei Filius — Dogmatic constitution on God the Creator, the natural knowability of God, the distinction and harmony of natural and supernatural orders, and the gratuity of revelation.
- Back to citation Catechism of the Catholic Church, 39–43 — Authoritative teaching that purified creaturely language truly attains to God while remaining analogical and forever surpassed by the divine essence.
- Back to citation John Paul II, Fides et Ratio — Encyclical on the harmony of faith and reason, the enduring value of Aquinas, metaphysical realism, and legitimate philosophical plurality within Catholic faith.