St. Thomas Aquinas and Bl. John Duns Scotus

[Kephapaulos]

I would like to look at these sources concerning differences between St. Thomas Aquinas and Bl. John Duns Scotus if I get time to do so:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBU_Zzk3wYw

http://faculty.fordham.edu/pini/pini/Blank_files/Two%20Models%20of%20Thinking.pdf

http://iteadthomam.blogspot.com/2008/12/aquinas-vs-scotus-on-motive-of.html (by Rev. Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange)

http://absoluteprimacyofchrist.org/st-thomas-aquinas-unconditional-incarnation-possible-and-probable/

http://absoluteprimacyofchrist.org/scotus-doctrine-of-the-primacy-is-a-historical-counter-factual-and-hypothetical-in-nature/

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/january/20.72.html

What do you think?

[Geremia]

When reading Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange's Reality: A Synthesis of Thomistic Thought, I made notes of where he discussed Scotus (and Suarez) vs. St. Thomas. The differences are very radical.

According to Scotus, in contrast to St. Thomas,

• being is univocal, not analogical;
  

  "Being, for St. Thomas, is a notion, not univocal but analogous, since otherwise it could not be divided and diversified. A univocal idea (e. g.: genus) is diversified by differences extrinsic to genus (animality, e. g.: by specific animal differences). Now, nothing is extrinsic to being (ens). Here Parmenides enters. Being, he says, cannot be something other than being, and the only other thing than being is nothing, is non-being, and non-being is not. St. Thomas replies: 'Parmenides and his followers were deceived in this: They used the word being (ens) as if it were univocal, one in idea and nature, as if it were a genus. This is an impossible position. Being (ens) is not a genus, since it is found in things generically diversified.' [In Metaph.: Bk. 1, chap. 5, lect. 9. See the fourth of the twenty-four Thomistic theses].
  
  "Duns Scotus returns in a manner to the position of Parmenides, that being is a univocal notion. Suarez, seeking a middle way between Aquinas and Scotus, maintains that the objective concept of being (ens) is simply one (simpliciter unus): and that consequently everything that is in any manner (e. g.: matter and essence) is being in act (ens in actu). This viewpoint granted, we can no longer conceive pure potency. It would be extra ens, hence, simply nothing. The Aristotelian notion of real potency (medium between actuality and nothing) disappears, and the argument of Parmenides is insoluble.
  
  "We understand now why, shortly after the Council of Trent, a Thomist, Reginaldus, O. P.: formulated as follows the three principles of St. Thomas:
  
  "Ens (being) is a notion transcendent and analogous, not univocal.
  God is pure act, God alone is His own existence.
  Things absolute have species from themselves; things relative from something else."

• angels reason as humans do;
• the will, not the intellect, is primary (against Thomistic Thesis #21);
• God would've incarnated even if Adam had not sinned, albeit with an impassible body;
• the supernatural end of man can be naturally known (cf. Feingold's The Natural Desire to See God According to St Thomas and His Interpreters Faith and Reason Studies in Catholic Theology and Philosophy ch. 4 "Scotus" (p. 47 f.).
• the accidental form of "this-ness" (hæcitas or haecceity) is the principle of individuation, not matter.

There are probably many more differences.
In the beginning of ch. 3 "The Thomistic Commentators" of Reality, Fr. G.-L. refuses to mention the "eclectic commentators, who indeed borrow largely from Thomas, but seek to unite him with Duns Scotus, refuting at times one by the other, at the risk of nearly always oscillating between the two, without ever taking a definite stand." Scotus and St. Thomas radically disagree on philosophical principles.

[Geremia]

Regarding their differences in philosophy, I found the following table by the Catholic philosopher Roger Ariew in his book:

• Roger Ariew, Descartes among the Scholastics (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2011), pp. 83-84.

Thomas	Scotus
1. The proper object of the human intellect is the quiddity of material being (quidditas rei materiali)1	1*. The proper object of the human intellect is being in general (ens in quantum est)2
2. Only analogical predication holds between God and creatures3	2*. The concept of being holds univocally between God and creatures4
3. Man is a unity of single form (the rational soul)5	3*. Man is a composite of a plurality of forms (rational, sensitive, and vegetative souls)6
4. Prime matter is pure potency 7	4*. Prime matter can subsist independently of form by God's omnipotence 8
5. The principle of individuation is signate matter (materia signata quantitate)9	5*. The principle of individuation is a haecceity, or form10
6. The immobility of the universe as a whole is the frame of reference for motion11	6*. Space is radically relative: there is no absolute frame of reference for motion12
7. Without motion there would be no time13	7*. Time is independent of motion 14

• Aquinas Summa Theologica I, quaest. 84, art. 7.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense I, dist. 3, quaest. 3.
• Aquinas Summa Theologica I, quaest. 13, art. 5.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, II, dist. 3, quaest. 2.
• Aquinas Summa Theologica, I, quaest. 76, art. 3.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, IV, dist. 11, quaest. 3.
• Aquinas Summa Theologica I, quaest. 66, art. 1.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, II, dist. 12, quaest. 1.
• Aquinas De Ente et Essentia, chap. 3.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, II, dist. 3, quaest. 6.
• Aquinas De Physica, IV, lectio 8.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Quaestiones Quodlibetales, quaest. XII.
• Aquinas De Physica, IV, lectio 16-17.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Quaestiones Quodlibetales, quaest. XI.

Ariew describes the differences in more detail after this table.
There's also a section in that book on Descartes's Scotism (pp. 94ff.).

[Geremia]

Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., God: His Existence and His Nature vol. 2 (PDF/DjVu p. 233 n.7) cites

• Luis González Alonso-Getino, "El Centenario de Suárez" 15 (1917): 381–90.

pp. 384-88 of which are "the list of twenty-four propositions which, according to the Sacred Congregation of Studies, express the fundamental theses of the philosophy of St. Thomas" compared to "twenty-four propositions of Suarez on the same questions; of these latter, twenty-three are formally in opposition to the doctrine of the Angelic Doctor."

[Kephapaulos]

Suarez mixed a lot of Scotus into his philosophy it seems then. Does Suarez have greater importance in regard to theology then rather than philosophy?

Also, would pure potency be the form of prime matter? Or should I phrase it "is pure potency the form of prime matter"?

[Geremia]

Does Suarez have greater importance in regard to theology then rather than philosophy?

He influenced (for the worse...) philosophy. He has an incorrect view on relation, setting up an unbreachable divide between mind-independent and mind-dependent orders, remnicient of the mind-body "problem" of Jesuit-educated Descartes (✝1650).

Suárez's De angelis is a prolific masterpiece in angelology.

Suárez is eclectic, half-Thomist, half-Scotist.

Also, would pure potency be the form of prime matter? Or should I phrase it "is pure potency the form of prime matter"?

Form and matter, actuality and potentiality are distinct. Prime matter has no form, no actuality.

[Geremia]

Regarding their differences in philosophy, I found the following table by the Catholic philosopher Roger Ariew in his book:

• Roger Ariew, Descartes among the Scholastics (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2011), pp. 83-84.

Thomas	Scotus
1. The proper object of the human intellect is the quiddity of material being (quidditas rei materiali)1	1*. The proper object of the human intellect is being in general (ens in quantum est)2
2. Only analogical predication holds between God and creatures3	2*. The concept of being holds univocally between God and creatures4
3. Man is a unity of single form (the rational soul)5	3*. Man is a composite of a plurality of forms (rational, sensitive, and vegetative souls)6
4. Prime matter is pure potency 7	4*. Prime matter can subsist independently of form by God's omnipotence 8
5. The principle of individuation is signate matter (materia signata quantitate)9	5*. The principle of individuation is a haecceity, or form10
6. The immobility of the universe as a whole is the frame of reference for motion11	6*. Space is radically relative: there is no absolute frame of reference for motion12
7. Without motion there would be no time13	7*. Time is independent of motion 14

• Aquinas Summa Theologica I, quaest. 84, art. 7.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense I, dist. 3, quaest. 3.
• Aquinas Summa Theologica I, quaest. 13, art. 5.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, II, dist. 3, quaest. 2.
• Aquinas Summa Theologica, I, quaest. 76, art. 3.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, IV, dist. 11, quaest. 3.
• Aquinas Summa Theologica I, quaest. 66, art. 1.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, II, dist. 12, quaest. 1.
• Aquinas De Ente et Essentia, chap. 3.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Opus Oxoniense, II, dist. 3, quaest. 6.
• Aquinas De Physica, IV, lectio 8.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Quaestiones Quodlibetales, quaest. XII.
• Aquinas De Physica, IV, lectio 16-17.
• Scotus Opera Omnia, Quaestiones Quodlibetales, quaest. XI.

Ariew describes the differences in more detail after this table.
There's also a section in that book on Descartes's Scotism (pp. 94ff.).

cf. his Scholastic Realism: A Key to Understanding Peirce's Philosophy, which is on how Scotus introduced Peirce to Scholasticism.