Man's Knowledge of God as It Will Be in Heaven

Section 2: Man’s Knowledge of God as It Will Be in Heaven

When we arrive in the abode of the Blessed, our knowledge of God will change. It will be different from, and far more perfect than the knowledge we have here below. Our mediate abstractive knowledge of God will give way to immediate intuition, while at the same time analogical will be transformed into univocal knowledge, inasmuch as we shall see God as He is. In this section we therefore propose to treat three important questions, viz.: (1) the reality and the supernatural character of the intuitive vision; (2) the necessity of the light of glory to the intellect of the Blessed; and (3) the relation between the intuitive vision of God and His incomprehensibility.

Article 1: The Reality and the Supernatural Character of the Intuitive Vision of God

1. Preliminary Remarks. — The expression “intuitive vision of God” is based on a metaphor which likens the human intellect to the eye. Bodily vision has two peculiarities: first, the eye sees a material object immediately, and, second, it perceives it clearly and distinctly. Analogously we may say that the intuitive vision of God means, first, that we know Him immediately, without depending on the created universe as a medium or mirror; and secondly, that our knowledge of Him is clear and distinct — an apprehension in the proper sense of the word. The quality corresponding in God to our intuitive vision of Him, is His visibility (visibilitas Dei), which some dogmaticians treat as a separate divine attribute.

If we take the term “vision” in its more extended sense, we shall be able to distinguish in abstracto a fourfold visibility, corresponding to the four different kinds of intuitive vision in God. There is (a) bodily vision (visio oculis corporeis), which, being metaphysically impossible when applied to God, can never take place, not even in Heaven; (b) that mode of spiritual vision by which we see God through the cosmos, or by an act of faith (visio abstractiva); this constitutes the sole mode of seeing God natural to all rational creatures, angels and men; (c) that mode of spiritual vision by which we envisage God immediately in His essence (visio intuitiva s. beatifica); it is in this the beatitude of angels and men consists; (d) the comprehensive or exhaustive vision of God (visio comprehensiva s. exhaustiva), which is denied even to the Blessed in Heaven, being reserved to the Almighty Himself.¹

Corresponding to this fourfold manner of seeing God, we may distinguish a threefold invisibility. (To the bodily eye, both in its natural and in its glorified state, God is absolutely invisible.) Since the created mind has no means of knowing God other than the abstractive-analogical apprehension proper to its limited faculties, God’s essence and substance must ever remain invisible to the created intellect, except supernaturally, by means of the lumen gloriae. But even in the light of glory God cannot be adequately conceived by His creatures, and therefore under this aspect, too, must ever remain invisible, i.e., incomprehensible, even to the holy Angels and the Elect in Heaven. God alone “sees” Himself fully and adequately to the limit of His essence and cognoscibility.

2. Dogmatic Theses. — The subject-matter propounded in the above preliminary remarks may be reduced to three problems, which we shall endeavor to solve in as many theses; viz.: (1) the absolute impossibility of a bodily vision of God; (2) the natural impossibility of an intuitive vision of God; and (3) the supernatural reality, and consequent possibility, of the intuitive (beatific) vision of God in Heaven.

First Thesis. To the bodily eye, even in its glorified state, God is absolutely invisible.

This thesis is partly of faith, and partly represents a theological conclusion.

Proof. To enable us to see God bodily, either God would have to appear in a material vesture, or our own corporeal organ of sight would have to be capable of attaining by supernatural means to a bodily vision of purely spiritual substances. Both these suppositions are inadmissible.

a) God, being a pure spirit, has no material body, and therefore cannot be visible to the human eye. This sort of invisibility, conceived as incorporeity, is a dogma clearly taught in Holy Scripture, partly in those passages which teach that God is a pure spirit,² partly in those texts that insist on His invisibility in terms which exclude every possibility of bodily vision. Cfr. 1 Tim. VI, 16: “Ὁ μόνος ἔχων ἀθανασίαν, φῶς οἰκῶν ἀπρόσιτον, ὃν εἶδεν οὐδεὶς ἀνθρώπων, οὐδὲ ἰδεῖν δύναται — Who only hath immortality, and inhabiteth light inaccessible, whom no man hath seen, nor can see.” Cfr. John I, 18: “Deum nemo vidit unquam — No man hath seen God at any time.” Asserting as they do the spiritual invisibility of the Divine Essence, these texts must a fortiori be understood as denying the corporeal visibility of God. In the light of these Scriptural texts it is not to be wondered at that the Fathers and the infallible magisterium of the Church have always considered the invisibility of God, as just explained, to be a revealed dogma and have defended it expressly and vigorously against the Audians and the Anthropomorphites, who attributed to God a material body and human limbs.³

b) Another question here presents itself: Would it be possible for the human eye, by means of some supernatural light sui generis, to attain to a bodily vision of God’s spiritual substance? Leo Allatius⁴ held that while the Elect in Heaven will not see the Divine Essence (he means the Divinity itself, not the human nature of Christ) until after the resurrection of the body, Mary, the Mother of God, with glorified eyes sees it already now. When, many centuries before Allatius, St. Augustine⁵ undertook to denounce this view as “insipientia et dementia,” his Catholic contemporaries were so scandalized by his harsh strictures that the great Bishop of Hippo in his little treatise De Videndo Deo,⁶ found himself constrained to admit that it would require a more careful investigation than any one had yet made of the question whether, in virtue of the metamorphosis of man from an “earthly” into a “heavenly” being, his spiritualized eye after the resurrection will be enabled to envisage the Divine Substance. While his offended opponents appealed to Job XIX, 26: “In carne mea videbo Deum meum — In my flesh I shall see my God,” it seems St. Augustine personally never changed his belief that such a spiritualization of the flesh was impossible.

In spite of the passage quoted from Job, the impossibility of the bodily eye being so highly spiritualized as to be able immediately to see God, while not an article of faith, is today generally received as a well established theological conclusion. St. Augustine himself trenchantly refuted the construction which his adversaries put upon Job XIX, 26, and other similar texts. With regard to the effatum of Job, he says: “Non dixit Job: per carnem meam, quod quidem si dixisset, posset Deus Christus intelligi, qui per carnem in carne videbitur. Nunc vero potest et sic accipi: in carne mea videbo Deum, ac si dixisset: In carne mea ero, cum videbo Deum — Job does not say ‘by the flesh.’ And, indeed, if he had said this, it would still be possible that by ‘God’ Christ was meant; for Christ shall be seen by the flesh. But even understanding it of God, it is only equivalent to saying, ‘I shall be in the flesh when I see God.’”⁷ The spiritualization of the risen body, of which St. Paul speaks in 1 Cor. XV, 44 (σῶμα πνευματικόν), by no means consists in the transmission to the material body of spiritual powers and qualities — for this would be tantamount to an impossible evolution of matter into spirit —, but in a clarification or transfiguration of the flesh enabling it to foster and support the activity of the soul, instead of pulling it down to the level of the senses. “Exit spiritui subdita caro spiritualis,” St. Augustine says, “sed tamen caro, non spiritus; sicut carni subditus fuit spiritus ipse carnalis, sed tamen spiritus, non caro — The flesh shall then be spiritual, and subject to the spirit, but still flesh, not spirit.”⁸ At bottom the whole question appertains to philosophy rather than theology. Philosophy, needless to remark, cannot admit the possibility of an intuitive vision of God’s spiritual substance by a material organ, for such a concession would imply that flesh could be changed into spirit without ceasing to be material flesh. The argument is strengthened by another theological conclusion, viz.: It is metaphysically certain that the bodily eye can see none but corporeal substances; on the other hand, it is de fide that the glorified bodies of the Elect after the resurrection will be and remain bodies of real flesh; hence it is theologically certain that the bodily eye, even in its transfigured state, can perceive only what is corporeal — consequently, that it cannot see God, Who is a pure spirit.

Second Thesis. No created spirit (angel or man) can by his purely natural faculties attain to the immediate vision of God.

So far as it applies to existing spirits, this proposition is an article of faith.

Proof. The supernatural character of the visio beatifica on the part of such rational creatures as exist under the present economy, was defined as early as A.D. 1311, by the Council of Vienne.⁹ But we have not the certitude of faith as to the question whether God might not create a spirit — say, an angel of the highest possible order — which would have a right to the vision of God in virtue of the perfection of its nature, this point having never been defined by the Church. A few of the Schoolmen (Durandus, Becanus, Ripalda) believed themselves free to hold the view that in some other universe than ours God could create a spirit which, in virtue of its very nature, might claim beatific vision as a right. Ripalda¹⁰ in speaking of such a hypothetical spirit, calls it “substantia intrinsece supernaturalis.” However, since Sacred Scripture and Tradition trace the natural invisibility of God to His innermost essence, the hypothesis of the possibility of a “supernatural substance” must be rejected as false and involving a contradiction.¹¹ Hence our present thesis must be made to embrace all possible spiritual beings; and in that sense it is certainly true, because the proofs drawn from Revelation are applicable to all created or creatable intellects.

a) Apropos of the Scriptural argument for our thesis, it must be noted:

α) The natural inaccessibility of the Divine Essence is expressly taught in 1 Tim. VI, 15–16: “Beatus et solus potens rex regum et Dominus dominantium, qui solus habet immortalitatem et lucem inhabitat inaccessibilem, quem nullus hominum vidit, sed nec videre potest — The Blessed and only Mighty, the King of kings, and Lord of lords, who only hath immortality, and inhabiteth light inaccessible, whom no man hath seen, nor can see.” It appears from this enumeration of such attributes as “blessedness,” “omnipotence,” and “immortality,” (attributes every one of which is quite invisible to the bodily eye), that the Apostle had in view not so much the bodily as the intellectual invisibility of God. Such expressions as “whom no man hath seen nor can see,” and “inhabiteth light inaccessible,” must therefore be taken as referring mainly to the understanding. Now if this light is inhabited by God alone, it follows that all who are outside of it — and all rational creatures both existing and possible are outside of it, because it is “inaccessible” to all except God — neither “see” nor “can see” the Godhead. Nor is this conclusion in the least affected by the circumstance that invisibility is here predicated of God only in relation to man (“nullus hominum”); for the decretory principle — viz., inaccessibility — is so positive and universal that it comprises not only the angels but all spirits in general (even those which have no existence). That, on the other hand, St. Paul did not consider it impossible for finite rational beings to be admitted into the divine “light” by the favor of grace, is quite plain from his teaching in regard to the reality of the supernatural vision of God in Heaven.¹²

Rom. I, 20, τὰ ἀόρατα αὐτοῦ … τοῖς ποιήμασι νοούμενα καθοράται — “For the invisible things of him … are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made” — can be quoted in support of the same truth. For “the invisible things of Him” (i.e., of God) are here contrasted with His visibility, that is to say, His knowableness in the light and by means of the created universe. That the contrast is intentional appears from the use of the words ἀόρατα — καθοράται, which are calculated to convey the idea that without the medium of created things, the Godhead is in itself “invisible,” i.e., cannot be envisaged in its essence. This invisibility is defined not as a bodily but as an “intellectual” attribute (intellecta — νοούμενα). Though St. Paul in the passage under consideration means to refer primarily to the human understanding, as the context shows, it is quite plain that he looks upon “invisibility” as such a characteristic attribute of the Godhead per se (τὰ ἀόρατα), and that we are not at liberty to make an exception in favor of any rational being, either actually existing or merely “creatable.”¹³

β) There are a number of Scriptural texts in which the intuition of the Divine Essence is described as the exclusive privilege of the Godhead, or of the three Persons in the Most Holy Trinity, implying that God’s intuition of Himself can be communicated to creatures, even those endowed with reason, only by way of supernatural grace. Cfr. Matth. XI, 27: “Nemo novit Filium nisi Pater, neque Patrem quis novit (γινώσκει) nisi Filius, et cui voluerit Filius revelare (ἀποκαλύψαι) — No one knoweth the Son, but the Father: neither doth any one know the Father, but the Son, and he to whom it shall please the Son to reveal him.” Similarly in John VI, 46: “Non quia Patrem vidit quisquam (ἑώρακέ τις) nisi is, qui est a Deo [scil. Filius]: hic vidit Patrem — Not that any man hath seen the Father; but he who is of God, he hath seen the Father.” The same thought is still more sharply brought out in John I, 18: “Deum nemo vidit unquam (Θεὸν οὐδεὶς ἑώρακε πώποτε); unigenitus Filius, qui est in sinu Patris, ipse enarravit (ἐξηγήσατο) — No man hath seen God at any time: the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.” Besides the Father and the Son, there is only the Holy Ghost Who intues¹⁴ the inner essence of the Divinity. Cfr. 1 Cor. II, 11: “Quae Dei sunt, nemo cognovit (ἔγνωκεν) nisi Spiritus Dei — The things that are of God no man knoweth, but the Spirit of God.” Whence it follows that no created intellect can, by virtue of its own power, penetrate into the Divine Essence. If the revelation to believing men of the mystery of the Blessed Trinity is a supernatural favor, the intuitive “face-to-face” vision of the same must a fortiori be a grace, and a much greater one. From all of which we may validly conclude that, according to the teaching of the Bible, the Divine Essence is absolutely invisible to any created being except through the operation of supernatural grace.

b) The Fathers formulated their teaching along the lines of the Biblical texts just quoted.

α) Those of the Fathers in particular, who did not content themselves with merely stating the dogma and showing it to be founded in Holy Writ, tried to bottom the natural invisibility of God on the metaphysical axiom that “the Uncreated cannot become visible to a created being.”¹⁵ They regarded solely the natural mode of cognition, as is evidenced by the fact that they did not hesitate to ascribe to the Elect in Heaven a supernatural intuition of God. Gregory of Nazianzus insists that an intuitive vision of the Divine Essence is possible only “in virtue of a special indwelling of God in the intellect and of the latter’s being penetrated through and through with a divine light”¹⁶ — a divine act which St. Chrysostom designates more succinctly as συγκατάβασις, i.e., a condescension on the part of the Almighty.

β) The teaching of St. Irenaeus is deserving of special mention because of its unmistakable clearness. He assumes that we can attain to a knowledge of God naturally, by contemplating the created universe, and then proceeds to distinguish three stages in the supernatural knowledge which man can have of God: (1) the “symbolical” vision implied in the Old Testament theophanies; (2) the “adoptive” vision exemplified in the Incarnation of the Logos; and (3) the “paternal” vision of the Elect in Heaven, which alone deserves the name of intuition. The principal passage is Adv. Haeres. IV, 20, 5, where St. Irenaeus says: “Homo etenim a se [per naturalia sua] non videt Deum, ille autem volens videtur [ab] hominibus, quibus vult et quando vult et quemadmodum vult; potens est enim in omnibus Deus. Visus quidem tunc [i.e., in V. T.] per spiritum prophetiae, visus autem et per Filium adoptive, videbitur autem et in regno coelorum paternaliter — For man does not see God by his own powers; but when He pleases He is seen by men, by whom He wills, and when He wills, and as He wills. For God is powerful in all things, having been seen at that time [in the Old Testament] indeed, prophetically through the Spirit, and seen, too, adoptively through the Son, and He shall also be seen paternally in the kingdom of Heaven.”¹⁷ He sharply differentiates between the natural invisibility and the supernatural visibility of God, when he says: “Qui vident Deum, intra Deum sunt, percipientes eius claritatem… . Et propter hoc incapabilis (ὁ ἀχώρητος) et invisibilis (ἀόρατος) visibilem se et comprehensibilem et capabilem hominibus praestat (ὁρώμενον ἑαυτὸν καὶ καταλαμβανόμενον καὶ χωρούμενον) — And for this reason, He, [although] beyond comprehension, and invisible, rendered Himself visible and comprehensible to men.”¹⁸

Third Thesis. The Blessed in Heaven, through grace, see God face to face, as He is in Himself, and are thereby rendered eternally happy.

This thesis embodies an article of faith.

Proof. “Ab esse ad posse valet illatio.” The very fact that Sacred Scripture describes the beatific vision as the supernatural recompense with which God rewards virtue in angels and men, proves the possibility of such vision, although, despite the existence of Revelation, human reason cannot demonstrate either the intrinsic possibility or the reality of the beatific vision, which is consequently reckoned among the absolute theological mysteries by nearly all theologians.¹⁹ The fact itself has been defined as an article of faith in the Constitution “Benedictus Deus” of Pope Benedict XII (A.D. 1336), which says: “Definimus quod [animae sanctorum] post Domini Nostri Jesu Christi passionem et mortem viderunt et vident divinam essentiam visione intuitiva et etiam faciali, nulla mediante creatura in ratione objecti visi se habente, sed divina essentia immediate se nude, clare et aperte eis ostendente, quodque sic videntes eadem divina essentia perfruuntur, necnon quod ex tali visione et fruitione eorum animae, qui iam decesserunt, sunt vere beatae et habent vitam et requiem aeternam.”²⁰ This definition clearly sets off both the reality and the supernatural character of the beatific vision. The fact itself is established in part (negatively) by the exclusion of every other medium of cognition, and in part (positively) by insistence on the immediateness of the act of vision. Its supernatural character appears from the fact that its beginning is traced back to the death of Christ and that it is described as the consummation of the theological virtues of faith and hope.²¹ All possible doubt as to whether or not the vision of the Blessed Trinity is included in the beatific vision, has been removed by the Florence decree of 1439, which says: “Definimus … [illorum animas] … in coelum mox recipi et intueri clare ipsum Deum trinum et unum, sicuti est.”²²

a) Holy Scripture promises to the just in the hereafter boundless bliss, which it calls “eternal life,” “the kingdom of Heaven,” “the marriage feast of the Lamb,” etc.,²³ and describes as a state in which tears stop flowing, pain ceases, pure joy and happiness reign supreme.²⁴

α) In 1 Cor. XIII, 8 sqq., we read: “Sive prophetiae evacuabuntur sive linguae cessabunt sive scientia destruetur; ex parte enim cognoscimus et ex parte prophetamus. Cum autem venerit quod perfectum est²⁵ evacuabitur quod ex parte est.²⁶ Videmus nunc per speculum in aenigmate, tunc autem facie ad faciem;²⁷ nunc cognosco ex parte,²⁸ tunc autem cognoscam, sicut et cognitus sum²⁹ — Whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed; for we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away… . We see now through a glass in a dark manner, but then face to face. Now I know in part; but then I shall know even as I am known.” As we have already observed on a previous page, the Apostle here contrasts the piecemeal, enigmatic, and per speculum vision of God that is vouchsafed us here below, with the radically different one which we shall enjoy hereafter, and which possesses the two distinctive marks of immediateness³⁰ and perfect clearness.³¹ Man’s knowledge of God in Heaven is a vision “face to face,” or “person to person,”³² which is opposed to the vision “through a glass”³³ that we have on earth. Again, the perfectum (τὸ τέλειον) is contrasted with the cognitio ex parte (τὸ ἐκ μέρους), and the perfect clearness of the beatific vision is illustrated in this wise: “As God sees me, even so shall I see Him”; that is to say, immediately, intuitively, clearly, without veil or medium, no longer by means of analogy derived from the created universe.³⁴

β) The teaching of St. John accords perfectly with that of St. Paul. Cfr. 1 John III, 2: “Carissimi, nunc filii Dei sumus et nondum apparuit, quid erimus. Scimus, quoniam, cum apparuerit (ἐὰν φανερωθῇ), similes ei erimus, quoniam videbimus eum sicuti est — Dearly beloved, we are now the sons of God; and it hath not yet appeared what we shall be. We know, that, when he shall appear, we shall be like to him, because we shall see him [i.e., Christ in His Divinity] as he is.” As in 1 Cor. XIII, so here our knowledge of God on earth is contrasted with our knowledge of Him in Heaven. Here below, until it will “appear what we shall be,” we are “children of God” in an imperfect way only; but in Heaven “we shall be like to God,³⁵ because we shall see Him as He is.”³⁶ In the light of these explanations we are able to understand the deeper meaning of the Saviour’s dictum: “Beati mundo corde, quoniam ipsi Deum videbunt — Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God.”³⁷ The angels, too, enjoy the beatific vision of God the Father, and consequently of the whole Divine Trinity. “Angeli eorum [sc. infantium] in coelis semper vident faciem Patris mei, qui in coelis est — Their [the children’s] angels in heaven always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.”³⁸

b) The Patristic argument for our thesis offers some difficulties, though these difficulties appear to be hermeneutical rather than dogmatic. Vasquez contends that such eminent authorities among the Fathers as Chrysostom, Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus, Cyril of Alexandria and Cyril of Jerusalem, Ambrose and others, deny that the denizens of Heaven enjoy the beatific vision of God. But even if this somewhat strange contention could be proved, it would not destroy the argument based upon the unanimous consensus of the majority of the Fathers. For, be it remembered, this dogma was not defined until much later, and its history shows a turning-point in the fourth century, when the Eunomian heresy began to influence considerably the tactics of the Fathers.

α) The pre-Eunomian Fathers simply teach, in full accord with the Bible, that the angels and saints in Heaven are vouchsafed a real “face to face” vision of God. We have already adverted to the admirably lucid teaching of St. Irenaeus. Corroborative passages can be cited from the writings of Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Cyprian, and others.³⁹

β) The rise of the Eunomian heresy led to a change of tactics, though the doctrine remained unchanged. Whenever the Fathers of Eunomius’s time were not engaged in controversy, they employed the traditional phraseology with which the Christians of that era were so familiar.

It is important to exonerate especially St. John Chrysostom from the charge of material heresy made against him by Vasquez.⁴⁰ Treating of the Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor, Chrysostom says:⁴¹ “If the bliss produced by a dark vision of the future was sufficient to induce St. Peter to cast away everything, what will man say when once the reality bursts upon him; when the doors of the royal chamber are thrown open, and he is permitted to look upon the King Himself — no longer enigmatically as in a mirror, but face to face; no longer in the faith,⁴² but in reality.”⁴³ Again he says:⁴⁴ “The just, however, dwell there with their King, … not as in a vestibule,⁴⁵ not in the faith, but face to face.”⁴⁶ It is only when he combats Eunomianism, or at least when he has this heresy in view, that St. Chrysostom uses expressions which might strike the careless reader as a denial of the beatific vision in Heaven. Vasquez points especially to Hom. de Incompreh., 3, n. 3: “Nulli creatae virtuti Deum esse comprehensibilem,⁴⁷ et a nulla plene⁴⁸ videri posse.” To understand this and similar passages correctly, we must consider in the first place,⁴⁹ that in St. Chrysostom’s time the distinction between such terms as knowing (γνῶσις), seeing (θεωρία), and comprehending (κατάληψις) was not yet clearly defined, and that the Saint was not minded to deny the simple visio intuitiva, but merely combated the comprehensio adaequata asserted by Eunomius. Hence such guarded phrases as these: “γνῶσις ἀκριβής, ἀκριβὴς κατάληψις τῆς οὐσίας, ἀκριβῶς γινώσκειν,” etc. An adequate comprehension of God, such as that taught by Eunomius, is plainly not granted to either angels or men, but, as St. Chrysostom himself elsewhere explains, is proper only to the three Divine Persons.⁵⁰ By putting a different construction on St. Chrysostom’s teaching, we should not only muddle the sense and violate the context of his writings, but make him contradict himself.⁵¹

γ) Vasquez’s accusations against certain other Fathers must be appraised in the light of this typical example. If St. Basil asserts that “the angels do not see the Godhead as It sees Itself,” he expresses no doubt as to the beatific vision, but merely wishes to emphasize the dogma of God’s absolute incomprehensibility, which makes Him inscrutable even to the Elect in Heaven. “The face to face vision and the perfect cognition of the incomprehensible majesty of God,”⁵² he says, “is promised to all who are worthy of it as a reward in the hereafter.”⁵³ Such was also the teaching of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, who, after declaring that “the angels do not see God as He is,”⁵⁴ immediately adds: “They see Him according to the measure of their ability, … the Thrones and Powers [see Him] more perfectly than the [mere] angels, yet short of His excellency;⁵⁵ only the one Holy Ghost, besides the Son, can see Him in a becoming manner.”⁵⁶

δ) We can spare ourselves the trouble of defending the other Fathers who have been attacked by Vasquez, because it is quite plain to any one who reads their writings carefully and without bias, that they teach just the contrary of what Vasquez imputes to them. If the one or other of them does here and there appear to deviate from the orthodox view (as, e.g., Gregory of Nyssa), they must be interpreted in the same way as St. Chrysostom. There is no solid reason for charging a single one of these Fathers with heterodoxy. St. Augustine already showed⁵⁷ how certain utterances of St. Ambrose and St. Jerome can be construed in a perfectly orthodox sense.⁵⁸ The only false note in the harmonious concert is an expression of Theodoretus in regard to the Angels, who, he says, “do not see the Divine Essence, but only a certain lustre,⁵⁹ which is adapted to their nature.” It is likely that this passage is the source of the heresy of the fourteenth-century Palamites,⁶⁰ who alleged that the divine attributes can be contemplated separately from the divine Substance in the form of a “garb of light” enveloping the Godhead.⁶¹

Article 2: The Light of Glory a Necessary Medium for the Intuitive Vision of God

1. What the Light of Glory is. — The term “light” (lumen), like “vision” (visio), has been transferred from the material world to the realm of intellectual cognition. As material light is the condition and the cause of bodily vision, so intellectual light is necessary for intellectual vision, i.e., cognition. As there are three states: that of nature, that of grace, and that of glory; so there are three specific modes of cognition, with as many different “lights” adapted and proportioned to each; viz.: the “light of reason” (lumen rationis), which comes from the Creator; the “light of grace” (lumen gratiae, fidei), which comes from the Sanctifier; and the “light of glory” (lumen gloriae), which comes from the Divine Remunerator.

Here we have to deal with the light of glory. What is the light of glory? Like the light of reason and the light of grace, the light of glory must be immanent in the human intellect, and hence cannot be objectively identical with the majesty or splendor of God (lumen quod videtur). Nor can it be the actus videndi of the Elect, inasmuch as this act, though immanent in the human intellect, is impossible without the light of glory, just as cognition depends of necessity on the light of reason, and faith on the light of grace. The theologians accordingly define the light of glory as a supernatural force or power imparted to the intellect of the Blessed in Heaven, like a new eye (or principle of vision), enabling them to see God as He is.⁶²

2. The Dogma. — The Council of Vienne (A.D. 1311) defined the necessity (and hence implicitly the existence) of the lumen gloriae, when, through the mouth of Clement V, it condemned the heresy of the Beguines and Beghards,⁶³ that “Anima non indiget lumine gloriae ipsam elevante ad Deum videndum et eo beate fruendum.”⁶⁴

a) The necessity of the light of glory flows as a corollary from what we have said above. If the order of grace and salvation instituted for all rational creatures is a strictly supernatural state, absolutely unattainable by purely natural means; if, in particular, the natural power of the created intellect is not sufficient to enable it to attain to an intuitive vision of God’s essence because He “dwells in light inaccessible” — then manifestly the cognitive faculty of rational creatures must, in virtue of the potentia obedientialis latent therein, be elevated to the supernatural sphere and endowed with the supernatural power necessary for it to see God. Whoever denies this conclusion must perforce accept the heretical antecedent that the created intellect is able by its own natural powers to arrive at an intuitive vision of God.⁶⁵

b) The necessity of the light of glory can be proved even more cogently from its relation to the habitus of theological faith. For while the supernatural habitus of love (habitus caritatis) will continue in the beyond,⁶⁶ faith, on the other hand, will cease, being changed into vision.⁶⁷ Now, if the supernatural life of faith here on earth is supported by a special habitus, viz., theological faith, it is plain that the light of glory, too, which takes the place of faith in Heaven, requires a habitus for its foundation; the more so because the beatific vision is far superior to the knowledge of faith, representing, as it does, the summit which grace makes it possible for any created intellect to attain.

Cfr. Apoc. XXII, 4 sqq.: “Et videbunt faciem eius;⁶⁸ … et nox ultra non erit; et non egent lumine lucernae, neque lumine solis, quoniam Dominus Deus illuminabit illos⁶⁹ et regnabunt in saecula saeculorum — And they shall see his face; … and night shall be no more: and they shall not need the light of the lamp, nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God shall enlighten them, and they shall reign for ever and ever.”

3. Scholastic Controversies Regarding the Nature of the Light of Glory. — While no Catholic is allowed to doubt the existence and the necessity of the light of glory — in the sense of “supernatural assistance” — we are free to discuss the question, in what the essence of this light consists, and what are its qualities; provided, of course, that the dogma itself is duly safeguarded.

a) Three Scholastic theories on the matter must be rejected as partly erroneous and partly inadequate.

α) We must reject as incorrect in the first place the opinion of that school which holds that a mere extrinsic elevation (elevatio extrinseca) is sufficient⁷⁰ for the supernatural equipment of the human intellect, or that it is at least possible.⁷¹ The essence of this elevatio extrinseca is held by its champions to consist not in any intrinsic strengthening of the cognitive faculty, but in the exercise by God Himself of an immediate influence on the natural intellect, enabling it to attain to supernatural vision. Some theologians, as, e.g., Cardinals Cajetan and Franzelin, regard this opinion as theologically unsound, and as involving a philosophic contradiction, on the ground that no vital potency can produce a supernatural act without undergoing an intrinsic alteration.⁷² Whatever view one may take of the possibility or impossibility of the elevatio extrinseca, this much appears to be certain: the theory does not accord with the spirit of the Clementine decision, because the term “lumen gloriae elevans animam ad Deum videndum” implies just as much of an intrinsic (qualitative) change in the principle of cognition as does the phrase, “lumen fidei elevans animam ad credendum.”

β) There is a second theory, which accords somewhat better with the sense of the dogma. It postulates an intrinsic strengthening of the soul by the agency of an unbroken chain of actual graces (gratiae actuales). If it is true that in Heaven faith gives way to vision, while charity remains, and both are of the same species, i.e., habitual virtues, then should we not expect a corresponding habitus visionis to replace the former habitus fidei? But this habitus visionis would be identical with the lumen gloriae. Hence, if the latter is at all to be compared to supernatural grace, it must be compared not to actual grace (gratia actualis), but to sanctifying grace (gratia habitualis), which inheres in the soul of the justified as a permanent quality, a habitus infusus.

γ) Thomassin and several other theologians⁷³ held that the beatific vision of God consists in a direct participation by the Elect in the Divine Vision itself, i.e., in an actual transfer of the divine act of intuition to the intellect of the Just. Thomassin says:⁷⁴ “Videtur Deus a beatis non alia specie intelligibili quam Verbo ipso mentem informante.” Nay, he does not shrink from identifying the light of glory with the Holy Ghost, falsely drawing from Ps. XXXV, 10: “In lumine tuo videbimus lumen,” the conclusion: “Ideoque lumen gloriae, quo videtur Deus, est Spiritus sanctus.” Such a confusion of the beatific vision with the uncreated Logos, and of the light of glory with the Person of the Holy Ghost, deserves to be called adventurous. While it is quite certain that God cannot transfer His own vital act of self-contemplation to any extraneous being, it is equally certain that the Blessed in Heaven behold Him in virtue of a vital act of vision proper to, and immanent in, their own intellects. Can I see with the eyes of another? True, the Holy Ghost elevates and strengthens the intellect per appropriationem; but He is not the subjective principle of energy from which the supernatural act of vision vitally emanates. Pursued to its logical conclusion this theory leads directly to Pantheism.

b) From what we have said in refutation of these false theories the reader can easily formulate the true view. According to the sententia communis, the light of glory consists in that “supernatural power which inheres in the intellect of the Blessed as a permanent habitus, enabling them to see the Divine Countenance.” This definition possesses the twofold advantage of being in full accord with the Clementine decree, and of satisfying the scientific dogmatician.⁷⁵

Article 3: The Beatific Vision in its Relation to the Divine Incomprehensibility

1. State of the Question. — The incomprehensibility of the Divine Essence must not be conceived as merely relative. God is incomprehensible to us not only in the natural condition of our intellect here below, but likewise in the supernatural state of glory in Heaven. Holy Scripture⁷⁶ and Tradition both define incomprehensibility as an absolute attribute, by which the Divine Essence is, and ever remains, impenetrable to every created and creatable intellect, even in the state of transfiguration and elevation produced by the light of glory. The Fourth Lateran Council enumerates “incomprehensibilis” among God’s absolute and incommunicable attributes.⁷⁷ Now there arises a difficult problem. It has been defined by Benedict XII (1336) and by the Florentine Council (1439), that the beatific vision of the Blessed in Heaven is directed to the infinite substance of God, nay, to the Blessed Trinity itself, which the Elect intue immediate, nude, clare et aperte. If this is true, how can the Divine Essence remain incomprehensible to those who enjoy the beatific vision? In other words: How can the dogma of the absolute incomprehensibility of God be reconciled with the dogmatic teaching of the Church that the Just in Heaven are happy in the intuitive vision of the Divine Essence?

2. Unsuccessful Attempts at Harmonizing the Two Dogmas. — It is plain that no attempt to harmonize these two dogmas by attenuating either the one or the other can prove successful or acceptable. The incomprehensibility of God and the reality of the beatific vision must both be accepted in their true meaning and to the full extent of their logical bearing. Because they fail in this the theories enumerated below are all defective.

a) By excepting from the beatific vision several divine attributes, and positing the essence of God’s incomprehensibility precisely in the concealment of certain unseen divine perfections, Thomassin and Toletus manifestly minimize the dogma of the visio intuitiva. Toletus insists that “Decem attributa distincte percipere, maioris est virtutis quam octo; ergo infinite percipere infinitae est virtutis. Divinae perfectiones sunt infinitae: ergo impossibile est, omnes ab intellectu creato percipi.”⁷⁸ But to distinguish between seen and unseen attributes is contrary to the absolute simplicity of the Divine Essence. That some of God’s attributes remain hidden to the Elect, in contradistinction to others which they do see, is a theory which can be entertained only on the assumption that the Divine Essence is split up into an infinite multiplicity of objectively distinct perfections, of which one might become visible while the others remained hidden. But the essence of the Godhead is physically and metaphysically indivisible. Hence, whoever enjoys an intuitive vision of this most simple Being, must envisage either all its perfections or none. To the objection of Toletus that in that case “sequeretur quod omnia Dei iudicia, omnes voluntates occultae essent beatis manifesta, quia omnia talia sunt formaliter in Deo,” we retort that God’s occult decrees and counsels involve an extrinsic relation, i.e., a relation to something which is not God. As little as the intuition of the Divine Essence eo ipso entails a knowledge of all real and possible creatures — for these do not form a part of the Divine Essence as such — just so little does a vision of the Divine Essence in its entirety necessarily imply knowledge of God’s free decrees, which have their terminus outside of the Godhead, and, therefore, remain hidden even to the Elect in Heaven, unless God sees fit to disclose them by a special revelation.

b) The second theory under consideration detracts from the dogma of God’s incomprehensibility. Its champions (notably Ockham and Gabriel Biel) assert that no concept formed of any object is complete, unless to the comprehensio intrinseca (i.e., an exhaustive notion of its objective cognoscibility), there is joined a comprehensio extrinseca, which implies that the subjective mode of cognition is the most perfect possible. This view does not necessarily deny the incomprehensibility of God, because after all it is only God’s contemplation of Himself which is entitatively and noetically infinite, inasmuch as only the infinite Being Himself is capable of performing an infinitely perfect vital act. But the underlying shallow conception of God’s incomprehensibility involves certain insoluble antinomies. It implies, on the one hand, that the Blessed in Heaven might enjoy a true and full comprehension of the Divine Essence without infringing on the ἀκαταληψία, inasmuch as, subjectively and from the noetic standpoint, there would still remain an unbridgeable chasm between God’s divine apprehension of Himself and the vision which He vouchsafes to His creatures in Heaven. It implies, on the other hand, that the attribute of incomprehensibility cannot be limited to the Divine Essence, but must be extended to all things without exception, even the smallest and most easily knowable. Not only God, but every truth (e.g., the Pythagorean theorem), nay, every material object (e.g., a blade of grass) would then be incomprehensible even to the highest angelic intellect, for the simple reason that an infinitely perfect mode of knowledge is possible only to an infinite being.⁷⁹

3. The True Theory. — St. Thomas Aquinas strikes at the root of the problem by reducing the incomprehensibility of God to His infinity. “Ens et verum convertuntur.” Therefore God’s knowableness, like His Essence, must be infinite. Infinite cognoscibility, however, can be exhausted only by an infinite power of cognition, and this no creature possesses. Hence it is in the infinite, absolute Being only that cognoscibility and cognition, being and thought, can be really identical. “Everything that is comprehended by any knowing mind, is known by it as perfectly as it is knowable… . But the Divine Substance is infinite in comparison with every created intellect, since every created intellect is bounded within the limits of a certain species. It is impossible, therefore, that the vision of any created intellect can see the Divine Substance as perfectly as it is visible.”⁸⁰ In the light of this explanation we can understand why the Elect in Heaven, though they envisage the entire Substance of God (including all His attributes and the Divine Persons), nevertheless do not and cannot comprehend this Substance either intensively, to the limits of its content, nor yet extensively, in its totality. They intue the whole Godhead (totum), but they do not intue it fully (totaliter); they envisage the Infinite Being Himself (infinitum), but they do not envisage Him in an infinite manner (infinite). As a keen eye, says Richard of Middletown,⁸¹ perceives the same color more distinctly than a weak eye, so the saints’ supernatural power of vision is proportioned to the measure of their merits, that is to say, to the different degrees of the light of glory vouchsafed to each, although they all behold the same object.⁸²

Readings: — Lessius, S.J., De Summo Bono et Aeterna Beatitudine Hominis, Antwerpiae 1616. — Kleutgen, De Ipso Deo, pp. 222 sq., Ratisbonae 1881. — Bautz, Der Himmel, spekulativ dargestellt, Mainz 1881. — *Franzelin, De Deo Uno, thes. 14–19. — Th. Conefry, The Beatific Vision, Longford 1907. — W. Humphrey, S.J., “His Divine Majesty,” pp. 46 sqq., London 1897. — Idem, The One Mediator, pp. 296 sqq., London 1890. — Schmitgen, Die Visio Beatifica, Würzburg 1867. — *G. B. Tepe, S.J., Institut. Theol., Vol. II, pp. 103 sqq., Parisiis 1895. — Scheeben, Die Mysterien des Christentums, 2nd ed., pp. 583 sqq., Freiburg 1898. — St. Thomas, S. Theol., Ia, qu. 12, and the commentators.