Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: The Trinune God: Systematics

Titel: The Triune God: Systematics

Stichwort: Person; Klärung der Vorfragen um Person

Kurzinhalt: QUESTION 10/3 -What should be understood by the word 'person'?; What does it seem should be understood by the word 'person'? The answer is that we understand five things. To begin with ...

Textausschnitt: 323d With all this well understood, we must return to our principal question, What does it seem should be understood by the word 'person'? The answer is that we understand five things. To begin with, 'person' is a common word that answers the question, Three what? Next, a person is, according to St Thomas's definition, 'a distinct subsistent in an intellectual nature.' Third, a divine person is a subsistent relation, or a subsistent that is distinct by reason of a relation. Fourth, a divine person is a distinct subject and is conscious of himself both as subject and as distinct. Fifth, by reason of their interpersonal relations the divine persons are not only related to one another but are also constituted as persons. (Fs) (notabene)

325a All of this is so coherent that everything else follows from the definition. Therefore, not all five of the above need to be verified concerning the Father, the Son and the Spirit before we can identify them as persons properly so called; the verification of the definition alone suffices for rightly calling them persons. (Fs)

325b On the other hand, since the notion of person, as we have said, became more fully understood over the centuries, later developments are not found explicitly stated in the earlier tradition. You will look in vain for St Thomas's definition in the works of St Augustine; but it is illegitimate to conclude from this that the Catholic doctrine of the divine persons is merely the convenience of a common name that allows us to speak more easily about the Father, Son, and Spirit taken together. Such a conclusion falls into the category of an opinion that has been condemned as follows: 'One must have recourse to the early sources [of revelation], and the more recent constitutions and decrees of the magisterium are to be explained by means of the ancient documents.'1 Similarly, although medieval theologians usually did not expressly discuss consciousness, it is quite clear that neither Catholic theologians nor even the Catholic faithful ever adored an unconscious God or unconscious divine persons. Who would ever ask for mercy from an unconscious being, and who does not think it must be asked for? But if it belongs to the sensus fidelium that the divine persons are conscious, it belongs to theologians to look for a way to provide a clear and distinct explanation regarding this consciousness, lest they incur the reproach of being useless servants who have buried the talent they have received from the Lord [Matthew 25.14-30]. (Fs) (notabene)