The Life of Moses

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Sébastien wrote:

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Quote # 2 in last email: I was quoting old Albert from memory, and did not get it exactly right:

“We have too many experiments we do not understand […] We still do not know one thousandth of one percent of what nature has revealed to us”.

“It is the theory that decides what we can observe”.

About the last quote here: Very true in particle physics, where the craft consists, as it were, in seeing in the invisible—seeing theoretically , meaning beyond the pre-imposed boundaries of naturalistic constructs based on mere models (e.g. Standard Model of Particle Physics and its bogus last piece, the world famous “Higgs particle”).

It is for this reason, so I surmise, that he also said: “The truth of a theory is in your mind, not in your eyes […] In a certain sense, therefore, I hold true that pure thought can grasp reality, as the ancients dreamed”.

To my view, it does not really matter that old Albert was recuperated by big bang dogmatists and mathematical crackerjacks. His own diehard mixed naturalism sure didn’t help preventing it. Yet his penetrative insights beyond the veil of positivistic thinking and dogmas in modern science set him apart philosophically. Too bad he probably never read St. Gregory of Nyssa…

At any rate, there is no doubt in my mind as to what he (old Albert) would have thought of CERN’s Promethean agenda. Apply to CERN and its LHC-based project of breaking through new energy limits this final quote of his:

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius—and a lot of courage—to move in the opposite direction”.**

“Where does St. Gregory discuss θεωρία?”

Especially 1) throughout his penetrating Life of Moses , wherein he insists on the epistemic contrast between two specific types of inquiries: ιστορία and θεωρία; and 2) in his Commentary on the Song of Songs , where he essentially dwells on the hermeneutic contrast obtaining between αλληγορία and θεωρία. Both texts are typologically very substantial and offer profound insights into the contemplating mind of a true exegetical genius. What’s also distinctive of St. Gregory’s overall approach is his ability to recognize the principles governing and correlating both the revealed text of Sacred Scripture and the universal order (visible and invisible) of creation.

As faith-related knowledge, theoria as conceived by St. Gregory is an ascending participation in divine Wisdom, coming to fruition in this life as quintessential intellectual vision of the mind considering (through understanding) the invisible causes underlying the work of divine creation—which is consistently echoed in St. Thomas’ definition of sapientia as higher understanding or consideration of the altissimas causas (ST , I-IIae, q. 57, a. 2).

"According to Catholicism, did Moses believe in the Trinity?":

Moses was indeed instructed in the mystical science and (literally) hieroglyphic [ἱερός = sacred, holy] sign -ification of the tetragrammatic but Trinitarian Name of the only true God, יהוה (Y-H-W-H).

The inspired description of the divine essence as relationality was given him to know in the properly heard revelation recorded in Exodus 3:14: “I’m being/I’m/I shall be who I’m being/I’m/I shall be” → an a-temporal ACTIVE present: אֶהְיֶה.

Thus, St. Moses did know, albeit in the mystical darkness of the cloud on Mount Sinai, that Y-H-W-H is He whose essence is to be itself (ipsum esse) as relation; He, that is, whose essence is to be relation to Himself—i.e. of knowing and loving Himself. Verse 14 tells us who this God is in terms of His essence, which is ‘to be’ itself as r-e-l-a-t-i-o-n → which the specific Hebraic relative pronoun is clearly intended to emphasize, אֲשֶׁר , as it connects (and thereby also differentiates) the mirroring/symmetrical clauses אֶהְיֶה (“I’m being/I’m/I shall be”) grammatically designating God’s indivisible esse :

“I’m being/I’m/I shall be [אֶהְיֶה] who [אֲשֶׁר] I’m being/I’m/I shall be [אֶהְיֶה].”

St. Abraham knew the triune God under a certain mystical mode of His blessed revelation (a true visitation and vision, see Gen 18:2), as he was visited by “three men” (אֲנָשִׁים), i.e. three subsisting personalities who are the One divine essence, whom he unmistakably addressed as: “My Lord…” (Gen 18:3).

He was the recipient of other revelations of the triune God (as were Moses and other holy Patriarchs), having seen and rejoiced in the day of the Only-Begotten Son (John 8:56) → in other words (dixit St. Thomas in the section and § you referenced to [above]), in mysterio Christi.