Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are diving into the ocean of truth. We’ve been going through the doctrine of God lately and our guide for this has been the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. Those who do not own a copy of this fine work can go to newadvent.org and read it online. We are studying the doctrine of how God is known by man. Before we get to that, I wish to present my usual prayer requests. First, I ask for prayers for my Christlikeness in especially that I will realize the truth in all things. Second, I ask for prayers for my financial situation. Finally, I ask for prayers for a third related area of my life. For now, let’s get to the question.
Do those who see God comprehend him? This is something many of us have wondered about eternity. After all, we are told that we will see God, but we wonder what exactly we will see. We are told that we will see him as he is. Add in to this that God is simple as we have seen. It would seem then that we cannot see part of God simply because he has no parts. The conclusion would seem to be then that we can comprehend God.
However, if we can comprehend God, then it would seem that we do not have an infinite God. Will it be that when we come we will see God as he is and then be able to know everything about him and thus be able to say “Well, that’s certainly interesting that that is the way that God is.”
Aquinas doesn’t think we will comprehend God. I agree with him. We do know God is simple and so there can be no parts to him. However, we also know that God is infinite and we by nature are finite beings. If we were made to be infinite, we would have to be creatures without limits. If we were creatures without limits, then we would have to have the other important aspects that are prerequisites for infinity, such as being simple, perfect, and immutable.
Thus, we see God as much as it is that we can understand him. If we comprehended him, we would be saying that our intellect is equal to his being, which is impossible. The problem again is not on God for God is the most knowable of all and infinitely knowable. We just have a finite knowledge and we can only know God finitely.
This also presents a problem for the Mormon concept of deity as in Mormonism, God was once a man and he eventually became God. I would hope that readers who have been reading up to this point, and I hope you will keep reading beyond this point have seen the problems with this as man would have to become an uncreated being, which is impossible. All creation will ultimately always have limits upon it by nature.
We shall continue our study of the doctrine of God tomorrow.
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