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| Aristotle (1811) Galleria dell'Accademia, Venice (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
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| Ancient Greek philosophers such as Plato and Aristotle would become highly revered in the medieval Islamic world. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
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| Portrait of Aristoteles. Pentelic marble, copy of the Imperial Period (1st or 2nd century) of a lost bronze sculpture made by Lysippos. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Metaphysics
In his first philosophy, later called the Metaphysics, (or “after the Physics”), Aristotle discusses the
meaning of being as being. He refers to
the unmoved movers,
and assigns one to each movement in the heavens and tasks future astronomers
with correlating the estimated 47 to 55 motions of the Eudoxan
planetary model with the most current and accurate observations. According
to Aristotle, each unmoved mover continuously contemplates its own
contemplation; they have no knowledge of the cosmos, nor do they participate
therein. The planets and
stars, which have their source of motion within themselves (by virtue of aether,
Aristotle's fifth
element) aspire to emulate the uniform circular
motion of their particular mover. Thus captivated, their tireless
performance is entirely the result of their own desire. This is one way in
which the movers are said to be unmoved. Also, because they are immaterial
eternal substantial form,
they lack any aspect of magnitude or volume and occupy no location; thus, they
are physically incapable of moving anywhere, or of moving anything. Likewise,
they must have no sensory perception whatsoever on account of Aristotle's
theory of cognition: were any form of sense perception to intrude upon their
thoughts, in that instant they would cease to be themselves, because actual self-reflection is their singular essence, their whole being. Like the
heavenly bodies in their unadorned pursuit, so the wise look, with affection,
toward the star; and hence as a role model, they inspire those who look up to
them, and by whom others still, will yet find themselves enthralled, and so on, creating the enduring natural order
of aeon, season, animal and plant.
In the Metaphysics, Aristotle discusses actuality (entelecheia,
Greek: ἐντελέχεια) and potentiality (dynamis,
Greek: δύναμις). The former is perfection, realization, fullness of being; the
latter imperfection, incompleteness, perfectibility. The former is the
determining, the latter the determinable principle. The unmoved movers are
entirely actual, Actus Purus, because they are unchanging,
eternal, immaterial substance.
All material beings
have some potentiality. The Physics introduces matter and form and the four causes -- material,
formal, efficient and final. For example, to explain a statue, one can offer:
- The material cause, that out of which the statue is made, is the marble or bronze.
- The formal cause, that according to which the statue is made, is the shape that the sculptor has learned to sculpt.
- The efficient cause, or agent, is the sculptor.
- The final cause, is that for the sake of which the statue is made, the (actual) statue.
Contrary to the
later so-called "traditional" view of prime matter (prima
materia in Latin), Aristotle asserts that there can be no pure
potentiality without any actuality whatsoever. All material substances have
unactualized potentials.
Aristotle argues
that, although motion is eternal, there cannot be an infinite series of movers
and of things moved. Therefore there must be some, who are not the first in
such a series, that inspire the eternal motion without themselves being moved "as
the soul is moved by beauty". Because the planetary spheres each
move unfalteringly for all eternity in uniform circular
motion with a given rotational period relative to the supreme diurnal motion of the sphere of fixed stars
(or First Heaven), they must each love and desire to mimic different unmoved
movers corresponding to the given periods.
Because they
eternally inspire uniform motion in the celestial spheres,
the unmoved movers must themselves be eternal and unchanging. Because they are
eternal, they have already had an infinite amount of time in which to actualize
any potentialities and therefore cannot be a composition of matter and form, or
potentiality
and actuality. They must always be fully actual, and thus immaterial,
because at all times in history they have already existed an infinite amount of
time, and things that do not actually come to fruition given unlimited
opportunities to do so cannot potentially do so.
The life of the
unmoved mover is self-contemplative thought (noesis noeseos,
Greek: νόησις νοήσεως).[1] According to Aristotle, the gods
cannot potentially be distracted from this eternal self-contemplation because,
in that instant, they would cease to exist.
Influence
Aristotle's
principles of being (see section above) influenced Anselm's view of
God, whom he called "that than which nothing greater can be
conceived." Anselm thought that God did not feel emotions such as anger or
love, but appeared to do so through our imperfect understanding. The
incongruity of judging "being" against something that might not
exist, may have led Anselm to his famous ontological argument for God's
existence.
Many medieval philosophers made use
of the idea of approaching a knowledge of God through negative attributes. For
example, we should not say that God exists in the usual sense of the term, all
we can safely say is that God is not nonexistent. We should not say that God is
wise, but we can say that God is not ignorant (i.e. in some way God has some
properties of knowledge). We should not say that God is One, but we can state
that there is no multiplicity in God's being.
Aristotelian
theological concepts were accepted by many later Jewish, Islamic, and Christian
philosophers. Key Jewish
philosophers included Samuel Ibn Tibbon, Maimonides, and Gersonides, among many
others. Their views of God are considered mainstream by many Jews of all
denominations even today. Preeminent among Islamic philosophers who were
influenced by Aristotelian theology are Avicenna and Averroes. In Christian
theology, the key philosopher influenced by Aristotle was undoubtedly Thomas Aquinas. There
had been earlier Aristotelian influences within Christianity (notably Anselm),
but Aquinas (who, incidentally, found his Aristotelian influence via Avicenna,
Averroes, and Maimonides) incorporated extensive Aristotelian ideas throughout
his own theology. Through Aquinas and the Scholastic Christian theology
of which he was a significant part, Aristotle became "academic theology's
great authority in the course of the thirteenth century"[2] and exerted an influence upon
Christian theology that become both widespread and deeply embedded. However,
notable Christian theologians rejected[3] Aristotelian theological influence,
especially the first generation of Christian Reformers[4] and most notably Martin Luther.[5][6][7] In subsequent Protestant theology,
Aristotelian thought quickly reemerged in Protestant Scholasticism.
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