Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: The Trinune God: Systematics

Titel: The Triune God: Systematics

Stichwort: Der Akt des Verstehens 3 - das Objekt des Intellekts als Term (inneres Wort) und Endziel (Sein); Wort: inneres - äußeres; Unterschied: Akt (d. Verstehens, Denkens, Vermutens usw.) - inneres Wort

Kurzinhalt: The object of the intellect as its end is being, in the widest sense of the word ... But the object of the intellect as the term produced within the intellect itself is the 'word of the heart' or 'inner word.'

Textausschnitt: 2 The Object of the Intellect as End and Term

563a The object of the intellect as its end is being, in the widest sense of the word. For the intellect is that which can make and become all things, and 'all' is not restricted to any genus. Summa theologiae, 1, q. 79, a. 7 c. (Fs)

But the object of the intellect as the term produced within the intellect itself is the 'word of the heart' or 'inner word.' And since there are two intellectual operations, there are also two terms produced immanently, namely, the simple word or definition and the compound word or proposition,1 that is, the true or the false. De veritate, q. 4, a. 2; q. 3, a. 2; De potentia, q. 8, a. 1; q. 9, a. 5; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 5, a. 9; Super loannem, c. 1, lect. 1. (Fs)

563b The existence of these inner words is proven from the meaning of outer words. We speak of 'man' or 'triangle,' and we surely mean something by these words. Unless, therefore, you believe that universals subsist as real entities, you will necessarily conclude that universals are conceived in the mind and signified directly and immediately by external words. Again, human speech states what is true and what is false. What, then, is signified directly and immediately by a false statement? Unless along with the neo-positivists you maintain that false statements signify nothing, you will necessarily acknowledge a compound word formed inwardly in the mind and signified directly and immediately in an external statement. Finally, we all hold that human speech also signifies things, and yet we do not accept anything unless it is true. But the true and the false are in the mind; truth, in fact, is formally only in a judgment. Again, therefore, one must conclude that outer words signify things, not immediately, of course, but through the medium of inner words that are true. (Fs)

563c Hence, primarily and per se outer words, whether spoken or written or present in the imagination, signify and are not signified. Things, on the other hand, are signified, but primarily and per se do not signify. Inner words, however, both signify and are signified: they are signified by outer words, and signify things themselves. (Fs) (notabene)

563d For this reason one must be careful not to confuse inner words either with the act of understanding or with thinking, defining, supposing, considering, affirming, or denying. An inner word is that which is understood, is thought, is defined, is supposed, is considered, is affirmed, is denied-not, of course, according to its natural existence but according to its intentional existence. Intentional existence is the medium in which a thing is known. (Fs) (notabene)

565a Furthermore, an inner word is not noesis but a noema, not la pensée pensante but la pensée pensée, not an intending intention but an intended intention, not the intention of the one understanding, but the intention understood.2

For the relevant texts, see Theological Studies 7:3 (1946) 351-59 [Verbum 14-24]. On the discrepancy between the Scriptum super Sententias and Aquinas's other writings beginning from De veritate, q. 3, a. 2, see Theological Studies 7:3 (1946) 360, note 51 [Verbum 25, note 52]. (Fs)

565b With regard to the minor work, De natura verbi intellectus, the following observations will suffice. (1) Fr Mandonnet has judged it to be spurious; (2) the criteria proposed by Mandonnet on the value of the catalogues have long since been rejected by experts; (3) from external criteria Msgr Grabmann judged as more probably authentic a series of minor works, including the De natura verbi intellectus; (4) more recendy Fr Pelster, among others, has agreed with Grabmann, holding that external criteria make for probability while internal criteria make for certitude ('Die Thomas von Aquin zugeschriebenen Opuscula De instantibus, De natura verbi intellectus, De principio individuationis, De genere, De natura acci-dentis, De natura materiae, De quatuor oppositis und ihr Verfasser,' Gregorianum 36 [1955] 21-49); (5) it seems to me better for the time being to omit diese testimonies from this treatise. For the argument from internal criteria, even if it had been peremptory on all points (which Fr Pelster did not claim it to be), is better suited to determine chronology than to evince authenticity. Then again, authenticity is by no means a univocal concept: there are some works written by St Thomas and edited by him, there are others written by him and reported by someone else, and there are still others that can in some sense be called authentic, which have come from him in some way or other. This being the case, I have deemed it safer and more useful to eschew needless questions and explain the teaching that is found in works of certain authenticity. (Fs)