Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: The Trinune God: Systematics

Titel: The Triune God: Systematics

Stichwort: Person; Frage: Augustinus; Definitionen: Boethius, Thomas -> Übereinstimmung in der Frage

Kurzinhalt: QUESTION 10/1 -What should be understood by the word 'person'?;
What was new in the definitions of Boethius, Richard, and St Thomas is that sometimes they asked not the particular question, Three what? or, What is a divine person?

Textausschnitt: QUESTION 10 What should be understood by the word 'person'?

309a From what we have said, it is clear that there are in God three real relations that are subsistent and really distinct from one another, namely, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Now we ask whether these relations are truly persons in the proper sense. The first thing to determine, therefore, is what is to be understood by the word 'person.'

309b There are five ways in which this question is answered. First, it was observed that some common word was needed, so that those whom we singly call the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, we may speak of in common as persons. As St Augustine put it, 'When we ask, Three what? or Three who? we are led to find some special or general word under which we may include all three, and none has occurred to us ...'1 '[Human limitation] asked what it should call the Three. And it replied, "substances" or "persons." By these names it did not wish to convey any idea of diversity, but it wished to avoid any idea of singleness, so that not only would unity be understood by speaking of one essence, but also trinity would be understood by speaking of three substances or three persons.'2 (Fs)

309c Second, after this answer, definitions were formulated, most notably that of Boethius, 'individual substance of a rational nature,' that of Richard of St Victor, 'incommunicable existence of the divine nature,' and that of St Thomas, 'distinct subsistent in an intellectual nature.'
309d Third, theories that were more or less metaphysical were proposed by Scotus, Capreolus, Cajetan, Suarez, Tiphanus, and possibly others. (Fs)

309e Fourth, it seemed that the person should be said to be consciousness, or conscious individuality, or a distinct center of consciousness, or some other psychological reality. (Fs)

309f Fifth, and finally, the person is explained in such a way that it has to be apprehended concretely. Thus, a person is one with whom personal relationships are entered into, or one to whom one can say 'you,' or whatever is simply distinguished from the category of 'things,' or one who is by nature ordered to communication with other persons, and so on. These, however, are not to be understood as definitions but rather as descriptions of what everyone should find by consulting his or her own personal life experience. (Fs)

311a The only unity in all these proposals lies in the question itself. An example of this sort of unity is that, while for Aristotle fire is one of the four elements, now it is understood as a chemical reaction. Yet, however divergent these answers are, both Aristotle and modern scientists have the same thing in mind when they ask what fire is. In asking this question, both in some way have in mind the same nature that is to be understood in specifically the same sensible data. When this question, therefore, this dynamic orientation of the wondering and inquiring mind, is brought to bear upon determinate sensible data or upon determinate truths, it constitutes a heuristic structure,3 which remains somehow one whatever answers are given. (Fs) (notabene)

311b Now if this is granted, then one can understand how the five ways mentioned above are related. (Fs)

With St Augustine the notion of divine person was the question itself, Three what? Here we have already a heuristic structure, but there was apparently no answer yet, only perplexity. (Fs) (notabene)
What was new in the definitions of Boethius, Richard, and St Thomas is that sometimes they asked not the particular question, Three what? or, What is a divine person? but the general question, What is a person?4 (Fs)

311c Further, since these definitions cannot be clearly and distinctly compared to one another unless by raising metaphysical questions one determines what an intellectual nature is, what a substance is, what an individual is, what existence is, what is meant by 'incommunicable,' by 'subsistent,' and by 'distinct,' it is not surprising that Scotus, Capreolus, Cajetan, Suarez, and Tiphanus took the further step of expounding the meaning of person in terms of metaphysical theories. (Fs)

But there were many such metaphysical theories, and person was not the only disputed notion. So philosophers turned to gnoseological questions as being better known quoad nos; and since it was the custom to explain everything else in psychological terms, it was considered quite inappropriate to explain the person in any way other than psychologically. (Fs)

311d Since there was as great a proliferation of gnoseological as of metaphysical theories, in recent times thinkers have decided to cease all speculation and return to concrete life. The more people 'exist'5 as human beings and as persons in the true sense, the more clearly they will perceive how great is the difference in the meanings of different pronouns. For one who is able to say 'I' and one who can be addressed as 'you' are certainly persons; but whatever is referred to as 'it' is not a person but only a thing. This is open to explanation in many different ways, since it means describing the concrete personal experience of life that people have. (Fs)

313a This being the case, it is clear that besides the multitude of opinions about what a person is, there exists a single heuristic structure that has been developing over the course of time. St Augustine's particular question is not left aside when we ask about the person in a general sense. Nor do we overlook the various definitions of person when we inquire more deeply into the metaphysical foundations. Nor does the knowledge of things through the ultimate causes of being exclude a study of conscious being. Nor does a general consideration of conscious being prevent us from investigating being that is conscious of itself in its concrete relationships. Accordingly, we will call the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit persons: persons in name, persons by definition, persons by reason of metaphysical constitution, persons by reason of consciousness, and persons by reason of relations both among themselves and to us. (Fs)