Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: Collection: Papers bei B. Lonergan

Titel: Collection: Papers bei B. Lonergan

Stichwort: intelligere; Verstehen: formales Objekt, Formalobjekt (Sein) - materiales Objekt (Materialobjekt; proper object); Paradox des endlichen Intellekts

Kurzinhalt: Besides the proper object of human intellect, there is its formal object. The proper object pertains to human intellect as human, as specifically different from other types of intellect. The formal object pertains to human intellect as intellect, ...

Textausschnitt: 176a Ninthly, a hypothetical reader may interpose that he too finds quite odd my meaning when I employ such terms as intelligere, quidditas, quid sit, quidditative, and even ens. (Fs)

176b Reply: The act that occurs when the teacher teaches and the learner learns is from the teacher and in the learner; it is named understanding, intelligere. It occurs frequently in the intelligent and rarely in the slow-witted. When it has occurred, one finds things clear; when it has not, one finds things obscure; thus one and the same mathematical theorem can be a masterpiece of elegance to one man and an insoluble puzzle to another. Further, once a man has understood, he no longer needs the teacher; he can operate on his own; he can repeat similar and cognate acts of understanding with ease, promptitude, and pleasure; he has an acquired habit. (Fs) (notabene)

176c The object of the act of understanding is the intelligible; the intelligible is expressed in concepts, but its basic occurrence is prior to the occurrence of the concept. When one finds things obscure, one cannot conceive them, define them, think them; they are for one, unless one is modest, inconceivable, indefinite, unthinkable. Hence, before one can conceive, one must understand; and, of course, unless one is rash, before one can judge, one must both understand and conceive. (Fs)

176d The intelligible, grasped by human understanding, is known in the sensible, in what is imagined; it is the ground of universal concepts; nonetheless, it is related intrinsically to the concrete. Such intelligible-in-the-sensible is the proper object of human intellect; it is proper in two senses: first, in the sense that man in this life understands no intelligible whatever except as a derivative of that proper object, and secondly, in the sense that no pure spirit has as its proper object, its basic source of all intelligibility, the intelligible-in-the-sensible. (Fs)

176e Besides the proper object of human intellect, there is its formal object. The proper object pertains to human intellect as human, as specifically different from other types of intellect. The formal object pertains to human intellect as intellect, as having something in common with every type of intellect. This formal object of intellect is being, where being means everything. The fact that being, everything, is the formal object of human intellect cannot be demonstrated by showing that man does understand everything. But it is clear from the fact that man wants to understand everything about everything, that to answer any number of questions is only to invite more questions, that man's intellect does not come to a complacent stop until it understands everything about everything. Again, the same point can be made negatively. If the formal object of human intellect were not being, then it would be some genus; and if it were a genus, then intellect would be completely confined to that genus, as sight is to color, and hearing is to sound; but human intellect is not completely confined to any genus; it can raise questions about absolutely everything that exists or even could exist, and so it cannot be completely confined to some single genus. (Fs)

177a Now human intellect is not the only intellect. Each different type of intellect has its own proper object. But there can be only one intellect in which the proper object is also the formal object. For when the proper object is also the formal object of an intellect, then its natural act of understanding is infinite; it understands in act itself and, as well, everything else that does exist or could exist; such unrestricted understanding must be God, the principle and end of all actual being and, as well, the ground of all possible being. (Fs)

177b There results the well-known paradox of finite intellect. Because its formal object is being, it is orientated towards infinite understanding; and without this orientation, it would not be an intellect. Because it is finite, it cannot be infinite understanding; for that would be a contradiction in terms; and so its proper object must differ from its formal object. Further, it cannot be said that finite understanding, while it is not infinite, nonetheless has an exigence for the infinite. If one says 'exigence,' one means necessity or one means nothing; but so far from being necessary, it is impossible for the finite either to be or to become the infinite; what necessarily is infinite, already is infinite; and what is not infinite cannot become infinite, for the infinite cannot become. Nor does the revealed mystery of the vision of God change things in the least, for not even the beatific vision of Christ is an act of understanding everything about everything;1 and so not even in Christ is the alleged exigence fulfilled. (Fs)

177c If the meaning of the foregoing has been understood,1 it is not difficult to learn the words. One has only to read St Thomas and understand what is said. An intellect completely in act with respect to being is God.2 The proper object of our intellects is 'quidditas sive natura in materia corporali existens'.3 God is not a material substance, and so we do not know quid sit Deus.4 God is being, and since we do not know quid sit Deus, we do not know quid sit ens; in both cases our knowledge is analogical.5 We naturally desire to know quid sit Deus; actually knowing it, however, is perfect beatitude, natural to God alone, beyond the natural capacity and the natural will of any possible creature.6 (Fs)