Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol Chiara Paladini* Introduction The focus of this paper is the doctrine of exemplar causality of Peter Auriol, one of the key figures of the 14th century. He embodied the demands of his time, in which the authority of the ancients and their commentators no longer sufficed to justify the incorporation of a particular theory into a philosophical system without any close examination of the theory itself. Auriol's doctrine of divine ideas and exemplar causality has already been considered by Alessandro Conti1. He has shown how Auriol's critique of the traditional approaches of his predecessors ultimately led him to abolish the assumption that divine ideas exist. God's knowledge of creatures is explained in the following way: God knows his own essence. This knowledge indirectly refers to the particular creatures by different connotations. But these connotations play no role in creation, as ultimately the sole exemplar for creation remains God's essence, to which alone, and not to the ideas, the character of imitability can be ascribed. It still remains to explain how then the concept of imitability is to be understood, or how a single object alone can serve as exemplar for many things. If there are no ideas to serve as the intermediaries of 1. A.D. Conti, Divine Ideas and Exemplar Causality in Auriol, «Vivarium» 38/1 (2000), pp. 99-116. * Università degli Studi dell'Aquila. Divine Ideas in Franciscan Thought (XIIIth-XIVth century) ISBN 978-88-255-2191-7 DOI 10.4399/978882552191710 pag. 203–238 (dicembre 2018) 204 Chiara Paladini divine creation, then there can be no recourse to the principle of the direct correspondence between ideatum and idea, which goes back to Augustine. In this system, the structural isomorphism between the intelligible and the real world - which was based on the theory that things correspond to the immutable ideas on the basis of which they were created - can no longer be employed, as God (the exemplar) is one and simple, while the creatures (the ideata) are many and distinct from one another. Accordingly, the Franciscan theologian is obliged to rethink the concept of exemplarity in order to explain the passage from the one to the many. Like most scholastic authors Auriol discusses the doctrine of ideas in distinctions 35 and 36 of his commentary on book 1 of the Sentences (Scriptum)2. In the following I'll examine the quaestiones 2: "Utrum obiectum verum adaequatum intellectionis divinae sit essentia Dei, vel ens universale", 3: "Utrum omnes creaturae secundum proprias suas naturas et rationes quidditativas sint in Deo vita et in verbo ipsius3" and 4: "Utrum Deus cognoscat singularia cognitione certa" of distinctio 35. I also occasionally refer to quaestio 1: "Utrum intelligere secundum suam rationem formalem vere et proprie sit in Deo" of distinctio 35 and to quaestio 2: "Utrum ideae sint ponendae in Deo" 2. The only complete edition available of Auriol's commentaries on the Sentences is Commentarii in primum librum Sententiarum Pars Prima, Romae 1596; Commentarii in Secundum, Tertium, Quartum Libros Sententiarum Pars Secunda, Romae 1605. It is unreliable however. The edition by E.M. Buytaert (Scriptum super primum Sententiarum, The Franciscan Institute Press, St. Bonaventure NY 1952-1956) includes the foreword (Prooemium) and distinctiones 1-8 of the first book of the commentary on the Sentences. A new edition of Auriol's works is in preparation. A number of excerpts of his work have already appeared in Electronic Scriptum, W. Duba et alii (edd.), <http://www.peterauriol.net/editions/electronicscriptum/ contents/> (last accessed: 16/01/2018). This edition, (abbreviated to 'E-Scriptum' in the following) forms the basis of the present essay. 3. I have corrected the two erroneous transcriptions of the Roman edition by checking them against the manuscript Vat. Borghese lat. 329 (abbreviated to Vb in the following). My transcription have since been incorporated into the the E-Scriptum. To facilitate comparison between the transcriptions, I give the source from both the new edition as well as the Roman edition. Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 205 of distinctio 36. I first present the theories of the authors who are the principle targets of Auriol's critique: Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus (sections 1 and 2). Then Auriol's criticisms of these views are discussed (section 3). Finally, I elaborate upon Auriol's understanding of divine knowledge (section 4), in order to arrive at his proposal of exemplar causality: the doctrine of similitudo aequivoca (section 5). 1. Thomas Aquinas According to Aquinas's theory of divine knowledge4, God initially comprehends himself immediately as absolute and then as the similarity of things5. In the latter sense, he knows himself as imitable in different ways by different things (as the similitudo of all things), even if only in an incomplete way and to varying degrees. This means that God knows in himself all the possible ways in which he could serve as the model for creatures. God thereby also knows his own essence as it is multiplied into various ideas. In Summa Theologiae, I, q. 15 Aquinas explains exactly how this is to be understood6. Seeing as God's essence is comprehended by God 4. Cfr. J.H. Nicolas, L'origine première des choses, «Revue thomiste» 91 (1991), pp. 181-218; V. Boland, Ideas in God according to Saint Thomas Aquinas, Brill, Leiden-New York-Köln 1996; A.D. Conti, Paul of Venice's Theory of Divine Ideas and its Sources, «Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale» 14 (2003), pp. 409-48; G.T. Doolan, Aquinas on Divine Ideas as Exemplar Causes, The Catholic University of America Press Press, Washington D.C. 2008; J.H. Weed, Creation as a Foundation of Analogy in Aquinas, in J.M.J. Goris, H. Rikhof, H.J.M. Schoot (ed. by), Divine Transcendence and Immanence in the Work of Thomas Aquinas. A Collection of Studies Presented at the Conference of the Thomas Instituut te Utrecht, December 15-17, 2005, Peeters, Leuven-Walpole 2009 (Publications of the Thomas Instituut te Utrecht, 13), pp. 129-147. 5. Thomas de Aquino, Scriptum super libros Sententiarum, I, P. Mandonnet (ed.), P. Lethielleux, Paris 1929, I, d. 27, q. 2, art. 3, co., p. 663. 6. Thomas de Aquino, Summa theologiae, I, Fratres Praedicatores (edd.), in Opera omnia. Editio Leonina, IV, Typographia Polyglotta, Roma 1888, q. 15, art. 1, ad 3, p. 199. 206 Chiara Paladini himself under the character of imitability, it is only logically multiplied into various ideas. These are of the same nature as him and therefore do not at all differ from the divine essence, which is absolutely one and simple and which contains nothing foreign to itself. Thus the numerous relations of reason arising from the divine intellectual act do not contradict divine unity, as they do not introduce real multiplicity into God. From Aquinas' point of view it is clear that a logical multiplicity doesn't necessarily correspond to a real multiplicity. Purely logical relations (respectus rationis) could accordingly be multiplied through God's intellectual act, without this implying a real multiplication. Neither do such relations call the autonomy of God's intellection into question, as they only arise from the knowledge of a single object: His own essence. As Aquinas explains in Summa contra Gentiles, cap. 46, in the knowledge of all the ways in which it can be imitated by other beings, the divine essence plays the role of a species intelligibilis7. Therefore God has no need of other, external principles of knowledge in order to know many ideas. Yet the act of creation is not strictly-speaking conditioned by this cognitive process. In order to guarantee for God a certain power of decision during creation, Aquinas differentiates between a speculative and a practical knowledge in God and therefore also between two different ways in which the divine ideas are to be grasped8: 1) The speculative knowledge (notitia simplicis intelligentiae), which pertains to all that is contained in God's knowledge, independently of whether it is actually brought into existence by God or not. In this regard the ideas are only pure rationes, i. e. logical concepts of all that can be thought9. 2) The practical knowledge (notitia visionis), by which God's free will employs the ideas as models for actual creation. In this regard, the 7. Thomas de Aquino, Summa contra Gentiles, I, Fratres Praedicatores (edd.), in Opera omnia. Editio Leonina, XIII, Typis Riccardi Garroni, Roma 1918, cap. 46, p. 137; c. 53, p. 151. 8. Thomas de Aquino, Summa theologiae, I, q. 15, art. 1, co., p. 199a. 9. Ibidem, I, q. 15, art. 3 ad 2, p. 204b. Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 207 ideas are exemplars (exemplaria), i. e. the patterns to which God's practical knowledge conforms for the creation of all things10. The exemplaria are therefore the ideas of those things that are terminus creationis, i. e. those that become the objects of the act of creation and that really exist, did exist or will exist. So conceived, the exemplar ideas guarantee that the world is created by God, the artifex or intelligible cause, according to a pre-conceived order and as a whole as much as in all of its parts. Accordingly, everything has God as its archetype and each being is created as it is according to its own idea, in which it participates. Aquinas' view leads him to deny the existence of exemplaria, in the strict sense, for those things that do not possess a certain degree of reality and that will never come into being11.Whether and to what extent there are exemplaria for individuals is problematic. On the one hand in many places Aquinas claims that nature's purpose is not directed toward either the individual or the genus (whose concept can only be determined from within the species), but only toward the kind12; on the other hand he insists that God doubtlessly has ideas of individuals, as they are the object of divine causality and so also of his practical knowledge. Elsewhere he explicitly states that purely speculative knowledge of matter along with that of the specific forms (which correspond to the divine ideas) is sufficient for a complete knowledge of individual compounds13. This is why Scotus and many of his followers polemically allege that Aquinas' doctrine denies that there are ideas of individuals. 10. Ibidem, I, q. 15, art. 3 co., p. 204a. 11. There is for example no exemplar of matter, which is a potential ens and which cannot exist nor be known without form (ibidem, I, q. 15, art. 3, ad 3, p. 204b); nor of the genus, which exists merely as a formal principle and which together with difference constitutes the species; nor of inseparable accidents, which are only ens in alio, i. e. formal principles that fall to the subject by chance (ibidem, I, q. 15, art. 3, ad 4, p. 204b); nor of anything that exists not in itself, but only as a component of a composite. To the extent that all of these entities cannot be generated as such, God knows them only as concepts, as pure notiones contained in his power. 12. Ibidem, q. 85, art. 3, ad 4, p. 337a. 13. Ibidem, q. 14, art. 11, co., p. 183a. 208 Chiara Paladini Aquinas' doctrine provides no precise metaphysical collocation for the divine ideas. They arise from God's act of self-knowledge and convey the knowledge of creatures to God, because he knows himself as imitable. The attempt to define their nature more precisely would only be undertaken by Aquinas' followers. 2. Duns Scotus Duns Scotus attempts to do just this in his doctrine of ideas, as presented in dd. 35-36 of his commentary on the Sentences14: in Scotus's theory, the ideas become objects of divine knowledge. In this regard, Scotus rejects Aquinas' distinction between speculative and practical knowledge. In his view, God does know all the possible by his essence, but there is no need to suppose an additional, practical kind of knowledge, by which God would know the ideas as the 'practical' archetypes of creatures. The ideas are initially all of the same nature and share the same status15. They only are differentiated when the divine free will decides which of them will 14. Ioannes Duns Scotus, Ordinatio, I, dd. 26-48, C. Balić et alii (edd.), in Commissio Scotistica Internationalis (edd.), Opera omnia, VI, Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, Città del Vaticano 1963, d. 35, q. un., pp. 245-270 and d. 36, q. un., pp. 281-290; Id., Lectura in Librum Primum Sententiarum, I, dd. 8-45, C. Balić et alii (edd.), in Commissio Scotistica Internationalis (edd.), Opera omnia, XVII, Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, Città del Vaticano 1966, d. 35, q. un., pp. 445-453; d. 36, q. un., pp. 468-471; Id., Reportatio parisiensis I-A, d. 36, qq. 1-4, T. Noone (ed.), in Id., Scotus on divine ideas: Rep. Paris. I-A, d. 36, «Medioevo» 24 (1998), pp. 395453. On the theory of divine ideas, see M. McCord Adams, William Ockham, II, Notre Dame University Press, Notre Dame 1987 (Publications in Mediaeval Studies, 26), pp. 1042-1050; Noone, Scotus on Divine Ideas, pp. 359-453; T. Hoffmann, Creatura intellecta. Die Ideen und Possibilien bei Duns Scotus mit Ausblick auf Franz von Mayronis, Poncius und Mastrius, Aschendorff, Münster 2002 (Beiträge zur Geschichte der Philosophie und Theologie des Mittelalters – Neue Folge, 60). In addition, on Scotus's theory of divine ideas see the chapter of E. Dezza, as well as that of T. Noone and C.A. Vater in this volume. 15. Scotus, Reportatio parisiensis I-A, d. 36, qq. 3-4, n. 51, p. 442. Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 209 be realized and which will not16. Instead Scotus differentiates between a first and a second object of the same knowledge. The first is the absolutely simple essence of God, which in turn represents within itself the ideas (and therefore the creatures) as the second object of his intellection. In contrast to his predecessors Scotus insists that God has no need to know himself under the character of imitability in order to know the creatures, as his essence is in itself representative of many things. But the two objects of intellection, the divine essence and the ideas, are each related to divine knowledge in two different ways. To explain how God knows both himself and the ideas, Scotus draws on the distinction between obiectum movens and obiectum terminans. While the divine essence can serve as both the cause of his intellection and as the first terminus to which his knowledge actively directs, the ideas cannot never be the cause of intellection, for that would be unworthy of the divine intellect. They can therefore only be known as the terminus of knowledge17. Regarding the status of the ideas, Scotus contests Aquinas's claim that they are to be understood as relations of imitability. He argues as follows: if the ideas were relations of imitability, then such relations would already have to be treated as objects of divine knowledge. But then they would in turn be knowable only by means of further relations of knowledge, which themselves would require still further relations of knowledge, such that ultimately God would never arrive at knowledge. In order to avoid such a regressus in infinitum, we must therefore hold fast to the principle according to which two relata must already exist prior to the relation. Thus the ideas should be produced as obiecta cognita by God himself prior to the divine act of cognition, in order to 16. Ibidem, d. 36, qq. 3-4, nn. 18-19, pp. 430-431. 17. Id., Ordinatio, I, d. 36, q. un., nn. 39-43, pp. 286-288. 210 Chiara Paladini subsequently be known by him18. This process is characterized by four moments, which are to be understood not chronologically but purely logically: in the first moment God knows his own essence. In the second he creates the ideas as res cognitae and immediately knows them, such that they become the terminus of his intellection. In the third moment God compares the res cognitae with his essence, and determines that they imitate it to a certain extent. Only now do the relations of imitability between the divine essence and the known creatures arise. Finally in the fourth moment these relations are known by God19. In this way Scotus does not aim to deny that relations of imitability obtain between God and the ideas. But he does deny that they play a role in the production of the ideas. They are rather the resulting outcome: God doesn't know the ideas through the relations of imitability, he rather forms the relations with the ideas, in that he produces the ideas in intelligible being and knows them. The priority of the obiecta cognita over the relations of knowledge in Scotus's theory thus serves the establishment of an intelligible world, which maintains the relative character of a respectus but which nevertheless has its own place in the divine intellect. It therefore possesses a certain degree of actuality in itself. For Scotus, this is what the condition for the intelligibility of the real world consists in. The ideas thus have objective existence in God's mind, an esse obiectivum, on the basis of which every being is what it is and can be known as such. Their mode of being can neither be reduced to that of a mental thing, nor it is the mode of being of a real extra-mental thing, as the ideas' mode of being visa-vis real existence remains incomplete up until their realization. Yet their realization only takes place through God's free will. Scotus 18. Ibidem, I, d. 35 q. un., n. 33, p. 258. 19. Ibidem, I, d. 35, q. un., n. 32, p. 258. Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 211 thus refers to the being of the ideas as a "diminished being20" (esse diminutum)21. Because Scotus no longer differentiates between pure rationes and true exemplars, to which the actual existence of beings corresponds, he is able to maintain that there are ideas of all actual, but also of all merely potential beings, and so not only of those that possess a particular degree of reality, as was the case for Aquinas. There are therefore ideas of matter, of separable and non-separable accidents, as well as of all parts of any whole22. 3. Auriol's critique From Auriol's point of view the foregoing approaches don't provide a satisfactory answer to the question of how God can at once know himself and many things (the ideas). The reason for this is for Auriol that his predecessors' theories posit a inner difference within God and thus lead to a multiplication of entities within the divine sphere, which Auriol absolutely wants to avoid. For him it is impossible for creatures to exist in God as distinct from one another, whether as relations of imitability, as Aquinas held, or as objects of knowledge, as proposed by Scotus. 20. On the esse diminutum, see A. Maurer, Ens diminutum. A Note on its Origin and Meaning, «Mediaeval Studies» 12 (1950), pp. 216-222; on the being of divine ideas in Scotus's theory see L. Honnefelder, Scientia transcendens. Die formale Bestimmung der Seiendheit und Realität in der Metaphysik des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit (Duns Scotus – Suarez – Wolff – Kant – Peirce), Meiner, Hamburg 1990 (Paradeigmata, 9); on the different interpretations of esse obiectivum in Scotus and Auriol see D. Perler, What Am I Thinking About? John Duns Scotus and Peter Aureol on Intentional Objects, «Vivarium» 32/2 (1994), pp. 72-89. 21. Scotus, Ordinatio, I, d. 36, q. un., nn. 44-47, pp. 288-290. 22. Id., Reportatio parisiensis I-A, d. 36, q. 3-4, nn. 21-22, pp. 431-432. 212 Chiara Paladini 3.1 Auriol's critique of Aquinas's theory Auriol refuses two core points of Aquinas' doctrine of divine ideas: 1. He denies that God needs a species, in this case his essence, for knowing ideas and therefore creatures; 2. He denies that from this cognitive process a lot of relations of imitability arise, which are those respectus, logically different from each other, that Aquinas called ideas. Auriol contests the first point in d. 35 q. 2 of his Scriptum. On the basis of a different theory of knowledge, in d. 35, q. 2 of his Scriptum Auriol denies that such a medium (the species) would be necessary for both the divine and the human cognitive processes. Indeed, the thesis that the essence of God would act as a species intelligibilis is based on the false assumption of knowledge being mediated by a species. He departs from the process of human knowledge, by which divine knowledge can also be illuminated. Referring to the Aristotelian principle "frustra fit per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora23" Auriol claims that recourse to the intermediary of species, which is supposed to grant our intellect access to reality, is by no means necessary in order to explain knowledge. Instead, our intellect itself is fully capable of accessing reality directly24. Auriol argues that if knowledge would be mediated by a species, the species would be the first and only object known and the knowledge, as a consequence, would always reflect on the species itself and never get anything different from it25. Hence, in 23. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 2, art. 4 (E-Scriptum, p. 19, 982-983; X, p. 783b, F): «Praeterea, superfluitas non est ponenda in rebus, quia frustra fit per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora, ut Philosophus dicit I Politicae et I Physicorum». 24. On Auriol's theory of perception see L. Lička, Perception and Objective Being: Peter Auriol on Perceptual Acts and their Objects, «American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly» 90 (2016), pp. 49-76 (and the literature cited therein). Further literature on perception and the significance of species in Auriol is given in note 33 below. 25. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 2, art. 4 (E-Scriptum, p. 19, 958-964; X, p. 783b, B). Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 213 the case of God, this would mean that he would not know creatures – which is untenable26. On the second point: In q. 3 Auriol wants to prove that even a purely logical multiplication of the divine essence into different ideas, which all imitate the one essence of God in differing ways, necessarily entails a kind of real division of the divine essence and therefore posits a kind of real difference in God. Auriol argues that all these possible imitations of the divine essence would be actually contained in God. A relation of imitability between one object and another presupposes per definitionem the correspondence of the object that imitates to the one that is imitated. If an imitation true to its model is to occur, the divine essence would need to be really divided into different parts in the act of cognition. But this can evidently be ruled out, as God's essence is indivisible. The idea that God's essence can only be logically (secundum rationem) divided and the resulting ideas accordingly only logically distinguished, must also be ruled out. For then we would have to assume that each idea really (secundum rem) imitates the entire divine essence – and consequently also that each is also an exemplar for the other ideas, just as God's essence is27, which is untenable and Aquinas surely did not hold. For Auriol, Aquinas's proposal doesn't suffice to explain how God can know creatures through his own essence, as it is one while the creatures are many. The idea that the divine essence can be considered by God himself from various points of view is according to Auriol just as untenable as if one were to say that it is actually composed of different parts, because even a logical distinction between the divine ideas would necessarily imply a sort of real division in God. 26. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 2, art. 4 (E-Scriptum, p. 20, 1009-1016; X, p. 784a, D-E). 27. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 11, 572-576; X, p. 795b, F): «Et si dicatur quod immo in plura secundum rationem, non valet quidem, quia quaelibet illarum rationum esset tota Dei essentia secundum rem, cum non posset esse pars eius. Tota vero essentia est omnium rerum similitudo, et per consequens quaelibet illarum rationum esset similitudo omnium». 214 Chiara Paladini 3.2 Auriol's critique of Duns Scotus's theory Scotus' theory, compared to Aquinas', must be credited for ascribing to the essence of God the feature of being absolutely and per se representative of many creatures28. In this way it breaks with Aquinas' idea that the divine essence would be imitable by creatures only under the character of respectus, that is to say by means of cognitive relations. However, it makes the mistake of multiplying the objects of God's mind in conceiving of the ideas as secondary objects of knowledge – which would necessarily put in God something different from God himself. In q. 2 Auriol aims to show that creatures can in no way be the primary, but nor can they be the secondary object of God's knowledge29. He argues that, even if God himself puts ideas as obiecta cognita in the divine essence, so that the divine intellect could recognize them afterwards, the primary object, i. e. the essence, and the secondary one, i. e. the ideas, would maybe coincide locally but not entitatively: they are not the same thing30. The problem is explained by Auriol using the metaphor of a mirror: even if the creatures were represented in God's essence like an image in a mirror, nonetheless they would still 28. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 10, 509-517; X, p. 795a, A): «Sed iste modus dicendi licet in hoc verus sit quod habitudines istas tollit, deficit tamen [...] quia imaginatur quod divina essentia ponat res in esse exemplato et repraesentato, ita quod divinus intuitus primo terminetur ad essentiam, secundario vero ad creaturas repraesentatas per essentiam terminetur». 29. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 2, art. 4 (E-Scriptum, p. 22, 1112-1115; X, p. 785b, D): «Secundo vero deficit in eo quod ait creaturas ut intellectas terminare per modum obiecti secundarii actum intellectionis divinae, nec esse formaliter idem in Deo comprehendere creaturas quam comprehendere essentiam, quasi sint duae comprehensiones et duo comprehensa terminantia intuitum obiective». 30. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 2, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 7, 350-353; X, p. 774b, D): «Sed manifestum est quod si creaturae relucerent in divina essentia tamquam obiecta secundaria, tunc Deus aliquid extra se positum intuetur. Extra, inquam, positum non situaliter, sed entitative, quia creaturae in tali esse positae non sunt ipse creator». Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 215 differ from God, just as the image in the mirror and the mirror itself are not the same thing, although the image is actually in the mirror31. This would entail an alterity between God and ideas. Furthermore, God would know creatures by something different from himself, something that he himself has created but nonetheless is different from him; and this is, in Auriol's words, a sheer sacrilegium32. As we will see, God's knowledge can terminate in no other object than his own essence. This remains one and undivided, and although it is connoted by manifold concepts, it cannot be determined by a multiplicity of ideas, neither in the form of objects existing in God nor in that of relations of imitability. Auriol's critique of the doctrine of ideas leads to working out of a new theory, in which no place is given to distinct exemplars: the theory of exemplar causality as similitudo aequivoca. 4. Divine knowledge in Auriol 4.1. The divine knowledge of specific natures In order to avoid the multiplication of logical and ontological entities in the divine essence, Auriol explains God's knowledge of creatures by means of a unique object, that is its own essence. To understand Auriol's conception of divine knowledge, we must first come back to his general conception of the cognitive process33. In q. 1, d. 35, which 31. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 2, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 7, 333-335; X, p. 774b, A): «Sed vidisse speculum non est vidisse rem in speculo, immo sunt diversi termini et diversa vidisse. Ergo creaturae non videntur a Deo per essentiam suam tamquam per speculum». 32. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 2, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 7, 353; X, p. 774b, D). 33. On Auriol's theory of knowledge see: F.A. Prezioso, La teoria dell'essere apparente nella gnoseologia di Pietro Aureoli, «Studi Francescani» 46 (1950), pp. 15-43; Id., La species medievale e i prodromi del fenomenismo moderno, CEDAM, Padova 1963 (Serie filosofica – Saggi e monografie, 42); Id., Ricerche sulla gnoseologia medievale, 216 Chiara Paladini treats of God's intelligere, Auriol claims that God's knowledge acts toward ("se habet") his own essence in the same way that human knowledge acts toward quality34. What exactly does he mean by this? Auriol has thought through the cognitive process anew. In his system, knowledge no longer occurs through the impression of the object upon the cognitive faculty. In opposition to prior tradition, which had ascribed to the intellect the passive role of the reception of the species, Auriol claims that the cognitive faculty is actually active, in that it is able to relate itself to something and to let mental objects appear, or even to produce them in the truest sense of the word. According to Auriol, two things come together in knowledge: an act of thought, through which an image (similitudo) of the object is produced, and the appearance of the object, to which the act of thought relates itself35. «Antonianum» 53/3-4 (1978), pp. 641-646; K. Michalski, Le criticisme et le scepticisme dans la Philosophie du XIV siècle, in Bulletin international de l'Académie polonaise des sciences et des lettres, Imprimerie de l'Université, Cracovie 1925, pp. 41-122; S. Vanni Rovighi, L'intenzionalità della conoscenza secondo P. Aureolo, in L'homme et son destin d'après les penseur du Moyen Âge. Actes du premier Congrès International de Philosophie médiévale, Louvain-Bruxelles 28 Août – 4 Septembre 1958), Nauwelaerts, Louvain-Paris 1960, pp. 673-680; Id., Una fonte remota della teoria husserliana dell'intenzionalità, in Studi di filosofia medievale II. Secoli XIII e XIV, Vita e Pensiero, Milano 1978, pp. 283-298; K.H. Tachau, Vision and Certitude in the age of Ockham. Optics, Epistemology and the Foundations of Semantics, 1250-1345, Brill, Leiden, New York-København-Köln 1988 (Studien und Texte zur Geistesgeschichte des Mittelaters, 22), p. 112; R.L. Friedman, Peter Auriol on Intentions and Essential Predication, in S. Ebbesen, R.L. Friedman (ed. by), Medieval Analyses in Language and Cognition, The Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters, Copenhagen 1999 (Historisk-filosofiske Meddelelser, 77), pp. 415-430; D. Perler, Theorien der Intentionalität im Mittelalter, Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main 2002 (Philosophische Abhandlungen, 82), pp. 253-317; Id. Zweifel und Gewissheit. Skeptische Debatten im Mittelalter, Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main 2006 (Philosophische Abhandlungen, 92), particularly pp. 239-245, 316-317, 266-272; T. Kobusch, Adaequatio rei et intellectus. Die Erläuterung der Korrespondenztheorie der Wahrheit, in M. Enders, J. Szaif (ed. by), Die Geschichte des philosophischen Begriffs der Wahrheit, de Gruyter, Berlin 2006, pp. 149-166. 34. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 1, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 26, 1468-1471; X, p. 768b, C): «Ad primum quidem quod intelligere in Deo non est qualitas, sed sic se habet ad deitatem sicut in creaturis ad qualitatem». 35. On the problem of cognition in Auriol, see in particular R.L. Friedman, Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 217 But the act of intellect and the resulting similitudo of the object only concerns the subjective part of the process: It is no more than a quality in the subject36. Through an intellectual act, the subject actively relates itself to a specific object within its mental "field of vision". In Auriol's words the subject "posits" the object in "intentional existence37". But for Auriol this doesn't suffice to explain how knowledge takes place. For the subjective act of thought can also theoretically prescind from the real presence of the object or produce visions that are either deceptive or to which nothing corresponds in reality38. If true knowledge is to occur, it is also necessary that the object, to which the intentional act of thought relates itself, appears to the knower39. The result of this process is not a qualitative Act, Species, and Appearance: Peter Auriol on Intellectual Cognition and Consciousness, in G. Klima (ed. by), Intentionality, Cognition, and Mental Representation in Medieval Philosophy, Fordham University Press, New York 2015, pp. 141-65. See also Id., Peter Auriol, <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/auriol/>, in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2016 Edition), E.N. Zalta (ed. by), 2016 (accessed: 01/02/2018). See also literature cited in note 33. 36. Auriol treats the topic extensively in Scriptum, d. 35, q. 1, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 11-15, 569-763; X, p. 755a-758a). 37. On intentionality in Auriol, cfr. Vanni Rovighi: L'intenzionalità della conoscenza, pp. 673-680; Perler, Theorien der Intentionalität im Mittelalter; Id., What Am I Thinking About?, pp. 72-89; K.H. Tachau, Some Aspects of the Notion of Intentional Existence at Paris, 1250-1320, in Ebbesen, Friedman (ed.by), Medieval Analyses, pp. 331-53; J. Biard, Intention et présence. La notion de presentialitas au XIVe siècle, in D. Perler (ed. by), Ancient and Medieval Theories of Intentionality, Brill, Leiden-Boston-Köln 2001 (Studien und Texte zur Geistesgeschichte des Mittelalters, 76), pp. 265-282: 270-77; F. Amerini, Realism and Intentionality: Hervaeus Natalis, Peter Aureoli, and William Ockham in Discussion, in S.F. Brown, T. Dewender, T. Kobusch (ed. by), Philosophical debates at Paris in the early fourteenth century, Brill, Leiden 2009 (Studien und Texte zur Geistesgeschichte des Mittelalters, 102), pp. 239-60. 38. So for example someone traveling on a river in a boat will see the trees on the bank as if they were moving, or someone who plunges a pole into water will see it as bent even though it is not. 39. The subjective manner of considering the object and the reality of the object considered must agree with one another. If this is not the case, insight remains misleading. This is why Russell Friedman corrected the first interpreta218 Chiara Paladini subjective modification in the knower, but an objective concept, i. e. a new "mode of being" added to the object in that it "appears" to the subject: an appearing being (esse apparens or esse obiectivum). This mode of being is one that is dependent on the intellect, but it is not to be identified with either the intentional act of thought or a quality in the subject. It is rather the object itself that, in being known, changes its condition and becomes a known object40. On this new model the object alone is not able to cause knowledge, yet nor does the act of cognition suffice to produce knowledge. Subject and object partake in its realization in equal measure. They are as it were two sides of the same coin. So when Auriol goes on to say that God's knowledge acts toward his own essence just as human knowledge does toward quality, he means that God's intellect relates itself directly to his essence (and only to this), and then posits it in apparentia obiectiva, in the same way that in the human cognitive process the intentional act relates itself to a object in its mental 'field of vision' and posits it in esse intentionali. The divine essence definitively remains the only object to which the divine intelligere directs itself and in this sense it is correct to say that God knows only himself. Yet this is not the end of the divine cognitive process. Auriol also applies the schema just described to divine knowledge. Just as in the human process the object must appear to the knower in tions of Auriol as a conceptualist and proto-nominalist and by contrast defined his doctrine as a moderate conceptualism: the receptive moment has doubtlessly withdrawn in favor of the productive function of the intellect. Nevertheless, knowledge must guarantee its relation to the inner structure of the extra-mental object. Cfr. Friedman, Peter Auriol on Intentions, pp. 415-430. 40. On this see T. Kobusch, Petrus Aureoli. Philosophie des Subjekts, in T. Kobusch (hrsg. von), Philosophen des Mittelalters: Eine Einführung, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt 2000, pp. 236-249: 241-244; Id., Das Verborgene und das Erscheinende. Grundlinien der Philosophie des Petrus Aureoli, in M. Gerwing, H.J.F. Reinhard (hrsg. von), Wahrheit auf dem Weg. Festschrift für Ludwig Hödl, Aschendorff, Münster 2009, pp. 246-266. Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 219 order for knowledge to occur, so God must appear to himself as his own object. That is the key that enables Auriol to justify the divine knowledge of creatures, without them having to become objects of God's knowledge. For this, Auriol draws on the semantic device of denominatio and differentiates between two ways in which knowledge can be considered: terminative and denominative41. In q. 2 Auriol claims that something is understood terminatively if it is the object to which the act of cognition is directed. As we have already seen, In God's case, that can only be the divine essence. In this sense the creatures are in no way the object of divine knowledge42. The result of this process is the apparentia, the appearance, the presentness to God of God himself. The creatures however can thereby also be known denominative, by the fact that what appears in God indirectly (in obliquo43), is the undivided totality of all creatures44. The use of the semantic tool denominatio or "connotation45" to explain divine knowledge enables Auriol to support his central 41. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 2 art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 10, 479-485; X, p. 776b, C). On this see Conti, Divine ideas, p. 114. 42. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 2, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 3, 142-146; X, p. 771b, B): «nulla intellectio est in Deo quae terminetur ad creaturas positas in esse prospectu, aut ad aliquid aliud a Deo». 43. It is clear that appearance in the divine realm is of another nature to appearance in the human realm. While the objects of knowledge appear to the creatures in a diminished, intentional being, God's essence and the creatures present in him appear to him in divine, real being. 44. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 1, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 26, 1368-27, 1375; X, p. 767a, D): «Unde patet quod intelligere est quidam conceptus connotativus, hoc est aggregativus duorum, illius scilicet qualitatis et apparentiae obiectivae, quae connectuntur se ipsis et concurrunt ad unam perfectam rationem ipsius intellectionis; qualitas quidem formaliter et in recto, apparentia vero extrinsece et in obliquo. Secundum hoc oportet intelligi de deitate quod ultra eam divinum intelligere nihil addit nisi apparentiam obiectivam connexam cum deitate, ita quod deitas ut connectens apparentiam obiectivam, est enim id cui omnis res apparet et virtute cuius /Vb 365vb/ omnis res sibi apparet». 45. Auriol uses here the two terms denominatio and connotatio as they were synonimous. 220 Chiara Paladini thesis, according to which God's knowledge has no object other than the divine essence. For denominative knowing does not in any way require that something (in this case the creatures) is directly the terminus or object of divine knowledge. This kind of knowledge instead only require that something is known insofar as it is indirectly (in obliquo) connoted by something else. Accordingly creatures are known to God in that they are indirectly connoted by the divine essence, although they are not the direct object of God's knowledge. As God's essence appears to himself, the apparentiae obiectivae represented in it also appear, which in turn refer to the creatures. It alone suffices as the foundation of the infinite connotations of all creatures. Appearance is a particular kind of relationship that doesn't come under any of the three kinds of relations provided by Aristotle in the Metaphysics46. It is not a numeric relation, such as equality, similarity and identity, as it does not express any similarity whatsoever between the two concepts. It is not a causal relation, as appearance implies neither an acting nor an suffering on the part of either of the elements involved. Nor is it a relation of measured to the measure, as appearance pertains to the object that appears47. For Auriol it is important to clearly distinguish connotation from relation, in order to clearly distance himself from those authors, particularly Aquinas, who conceive of the ideas in God as relations of imitability (respectus imitabilitatis). Such relations do not exist between connotative extremes, because their relationship is not due to a common similarity, as is the case with extremes related to one another. On the contrary, the connoting item (the divine intelligere) refers directly to something quite different (i. e. the divine essence) than that to which it refers 46. Aristoteles, Metaphysica, V, 1020b26-1021b11. 47. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 1, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 29, 1481-1485; X, p. 768b, E-F). Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 221 indirectly (i. e. the creatures). In order to explain this point, Auriol gives same examples of connotation: humanity (humanitas) and flesh (caro). These concepts always refer to something else: humanity is always the humanity of a human being, just as flesh entails a reference to something whose flesh it is. In the same way the "rudder" (remus) connotes the what is "ruddered" (remitam rem), and the wing (ala) connotes the winged (alatum). They refer to one another, because their being named is always linked in obliquo to something distinct from them. Relations by contrast are linked to one other by a respectus that mediates between the two extremes; each is thus related to the other through something common to both. An example is the case of Socrates and Plato, who are both white and thus similar, because white inheres in both of them48. With this argument, Auriol wants to show that there are no particular similarities that mediate between the divine intellect and his essence. The manifold relations of imitability of the tradition are replaced by a single connotative relationship, the one 48. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 1, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 25, 1276-1301; X, p. 765b, F-766a, D): «Talia igitur absoluta dicuntur connotantia absque hoc quod interveniat relatio media inter absolutum et connotatum, quod quidem patet. Tum quia talis ratio absoluta non concipitur per modum fundamenti alicuius habitudinis; unde non dicitur ad aliud ut fundamentum relationis, sed magis per propriam rationem, humanitas enim ex hoc quod est humanitas est humanitas alterius, et caro in eo quod caro est alterius. Non sic autem de his quae dicuntur alterius per modum fundamenti, album enim, licet sit simile alteri albo in eo quod album, non tamen vere dicitur quod album sit alterius album. Nunc autem vere dicitur quod caro est alterius caro et humanitas alterius humanitas (...) nam manus denominat manuatum et caput capitatum et ala alatum et remus navem sive remitam rem, ut Philosophus dicit in Praedicamentis". (...) "Sic igitur patet differentia inter <conceptus> connotativos et relativos, quia connotativi includunt rationem absolutam cum termino, sine habitudine media connectente, quia ipsamet ratio absoluta connectit propter sui condicionem, sicut patet de ratione humanitatis et carnis et de ratione alae et remi. Conceptus vero relativi, ultra rationem absolutam et terminum, includunt habitudinem mediam et respectum». 222 Chiara Paladini holding between God's essence (the Godhead) and the creatures. This is also why God has no need of intermediaries, be they relations of reason or known objects, in order to know the creatures perfectly. By the mere fact that the simple ratio of Godhead "appears" to God himself, the connoted creatures also immediately appear to him. his knowledge of each specific nature is therefore direct, precise, and not mediated by anything, for the undivided ratio of Godhead alone suffices for God to completely and precisely know each specific nature. A metaphor is helpful to explain this. Auriol writes: Non debet ergo impossibile extimari quod una deitas indivisibilis possit esse similitudo plurium quidditative distinctorum; est autem sic quod si imago, lucens in speculo, esset indivisibilis sicut species existens in intellectu, viso unico et indivisibili, utpote imagine illa visa, tota facies et distinctio partium eius cognita videretur. Sic igitur in proposito, visa deitate, quae est res simplicissima, quamvis sit deitas tota subsistens, dicitur tota entitas creata visa esse distincte, cuius ratio est quia deitas est similitudo eminens lapidis, et per consequens quidam eminens lapis. Et ideo ea visa dicitur lapis cognitus eminenter49. When someone looks at his reflected image in a mirror, he sees his face as a whole and not as divided in distinct parts. Nonetheless he still sees each particular part. In the same way, when God's own essence is "illuminated" and appears to God himself, God also immediately sees the undivided totality of creatures that also appear. He sees for example the stone, as the stone shines in God's essence as in a mirror and is eminently represented by it. This is why the becoming present of God's essence to himself is also the becoming present of all creatures to him. The divine intellect is immediately directed solely toward his own essence as the first terminus of his knowledge, but he simultaneously knows 49. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 16, 827-834; X, p. 799b, B-C). Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 223 all the infinite connotations and thus the creatures50. In this way God is the exemplar cause of all specific natures which differ from one another51. But it is important for Auriol that God knows also each particular individual which exists in the world. In what follows, we will see how Auriol develops this point. 4.2. The Divine knowledge of Individuals The notion of connotation had enabled Auriol to clarify how God can know the different specific natures to be found in the world simply by knowing his own essence. What he had still left unexplained is how God can have exact cognition of each individual within a species. To put it differently: what is connoted by the divine essence in God's process of self-cognition is e.g. the nature of man or stone, not this man or this stone as individuals (entia signata). Now, in order to safeguard the Christian principle of God's providence and omniscience, Auriol had to account for the fact that divine cognition extends to singulars. This issue fell directly within a debate between two opposite perspectives, i. e. the view that divine cognition must necessarily include individuals, and the idea, attributed to Averroes, that God 50. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 2, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 11, 552-557; X, p. 777b, C): «Licet enim essentia divina simplicissima sit in se, est tamen plures in connotatis. Quamvis enim essentia quae terminat intuitum divinum simplex et una sit tam re quam ratione, nihilominus ea cognita plura dicuntur cognita, non quidem terminative, sed denominative, ut patet ex praedictis». 51. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 12, 592-597; X, p. 796a, C-D): «Prima quidem quod deitas est similitudo propria cuiuslibet specificae naturae non quidem secundum aliam et aliam perfectionem quam habeat in se, aut secundum aliam et aliam rationem, ut praedicti imaginari videntur, immo sub una et eadem simplici perfectione secundum rem et rationem, quae importatur per deitatem, exemplar est omnium entitatum». 224 Chiara Paladini has no cognition of individuals. Aquinas, for example, accused Averroes of denying God's cognition of creatures in order to preserve his unity and simplicity. Against this view, Aquinas argued that it amounted to claiming that the producer (in this case, God) fails to know his own products (creatures). But this is impossible. Hence, God is bound to know individuals as well, insofar as he is the cause of each of them52. Aquinas' argument strikes Auriol as inconsistent. The view that God knows individual creatures since he is their cause seems to Auriol insufficient to ensure his cognition of individuals. He holds it is necessary to distinguish, within God, efficient productivity from exemplary productivity. According to Aquinas, God produces all individual creatures in the world (i. e. individuals, entia signata) as efficient cause. By contrast, as exemplar cause he knows within himself the models through which he creates things, and recognizes within himself all the possible ways in which he can be imitated by things – e.g. by a man or a stone. God, therefore, is a similitudo of the specific natures of things. He is not a similitudo of each individual falling within a given species and possessing individual differences which distinguish it from another similar individual (in other words, God is not directly a similitudo of e.g. Socrates and Plato). However – so runs Auriol's argument – even though God is the (efficient) cause of all individuals, this cannot be the reason why he cognizes them as signata. For God, as exemplar cause, when cognizing himself does not recognize himself as the similitudo of singulars, but only as the direct similitudo of universal forms53 – which was true for Auriol himself. Thus, Auriol had to explain how God, as exemplar cause, can come to know individuals. Once again, if we are to make sense of Auriol's view, we must turn to his conception of human cog52. Thomas Aquinas, Scriptum super libros Sententiarum, I, d. 35, q. 1, art. 3, in co., p. 816. 53. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 4, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 15, 730-739; X, p. 814b, D-E). Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 225 nition. Auriol discusses the issue of the divine cognition of singulars in relation to human cognition in Scriptum, d. 35, q. 454. One of the basic principles of Auriol's theory of cognition is that the first thing our mind apprehends of a sensible object we encounter is the general notion of it. Since Auriol regards common natures as non-existent, individuals are the only truly existing things. Yet they are not directly cognizable to our intellect. This is because no singular possesses an individual intelligible property, i. e. a truly individuating property which contracts the species and reduces it to an individual – as posited by Scotus. Auriol holds that individuals are cognized by the intellect in an abstract way at first, through simple and general concepts (ultimately, as "vague individuals", i. e. as concrete examples of a certain essence). In Scriptum, d. 35 q. 4, he claims that, in order to know an individual in its own individuality and to distinguish it from a similar one, the intellect must accomplish a second operation, which is performed through imagination (mediante imaginatione55). Imagination connotes, i. e. "marks", the sensible object. In other words, to the simple (abstract) concept which the intellect forms of it and which is common to all similar objects, imagination adds the aspects identifying it as a particular object, distinct from all others. Auriol describes the individuation performed by the imagination as an intentional setting of the object in space and time. By intellectually situating the object in a specific position in space and/or a specific moment in time (e.g. now or later), imagination "marks" the simple concept of the cognized object (the vague individual) and cognizes it distinctly as an individual object, i. e. a signatum. Thus, imagination produces the phantasm: a representation of the object that is no longer generic but "marked", i. e. 54. On this see R.L. Friedman, Peter Auriol on Intellectual Cognition of Singulars, «Vivarium» 38/1 (2000), pp. 177-193. 55. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 4, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 12, 602-604; X, p. 812b, E-F). 226 Chiara Paladini encompassing its distinctive traits as an individual. This representation is then transmitted to the intellect, which uses it to know the object in its specific individuality and to distinguish it from all similar objects. Auriol presents this process as the formation of a linear opposition. This is created by the mind through an intentional act whose extremes are the cognizing subject and the cognized object. The mind sets the object of cognition at a specific point (the endpoint of the intentional act, represented by a line), and thus knows it distinctly as a particular and determined individual. Each individual is situated at the end of a specific intentional line: all similar individuals, then, differ from one another by their particular (intentional) position. Now, as in the case of human knowledge, the divine intellect knows the universal directly, and individuals only in a mediated way56. God does not know individuals directly because the intellect (by its own nature, one might say) conceives specific unity before individual unity. In other words, it conceives each quiddity or nature (such as humanity or horseness) as a single and undivided whole, even though these quiddities do not correspond to anything real in the extra-mental world, but are only a conceptual or representational unity57. In addition, as we have seen, the divine intellect conceives each quiddity in an eminent way (i. e. in a more noble and perfect way compared to how each quiddity can manifest itself in individuals). Therefore, the divine intellect knows creatures in the endless connotations of its own essence, and not directly the creatures Socrates and Plato, but only the universal man that stands in the same relation of representation to both Socrates and Plato. This means that it does not distinguish them directly. It only grasps them as a single specific unity. 56. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 4, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 22, 1111-1112; X, p. 820a, C): «Est ergo considerandum quod deitas non potest immediate esse similitudo appropriata cuilibet individuo signate et indistincte, potest tamen mediate». 57. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 4, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 17, 870-879; X, p. 816b, D). Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 227 Auriol clarifies all this by referring to how God knows angels and souls. Since angels and souls are incorporeal substances, they possess no concrete nature. Hence, no angel can have a concrete nature similar to that of another angel – unlike corporeal substances, which possess concrete natures and therefore can present some similarities. This is the case of Socrates and Plato: they have two similar concrete natures and can both be represented by the species man. Consequently, in the case of angels (and all other incorporeal substances) there is no multitude of individuals that can be represented under a single species, but only – so to speak – a multitude of singulars, each with his own specific ratio. To put it differently: each angel and each incorporeal substance represents a specific unity in itself. Since there is nothing concrete that can make one angel akin to another, i. e. that can make two or more angels appear similar, numeric unity coincides with specific unity. Hence, with respect to the divine intellect each incorporeal substance stands as a single specific unity, i. e. in the same way as each nature or quiddity, such as man or stone, stands with respect to the intellect: as an undivided whole. Therefore, God can know incorporeal substances directly, just as he knows all specific natures directly58. Things are quite different in the case of corporeal substances. These possess concrete natures which may present specific similarities. Therefore, several individuals may be intellectually represented by a single specific image. This means that numerical unity (the unity belonging to each signatum individual) does not coincide with specific unity59. God knows creatures directly in his essence according to their specific unities. This is because, as we have said, he recognizes himself as the direct similitudo of specific natures, as man or stone, and not as the direct similitudo of singulars, as this 58. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 4, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 20, 991-1008; X, p. 818A-B). 59. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 4, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 20, 1015-1019; X, p. 818b, D-E). 228 Chiara Paladini man or this stone. As a result, he must know individuals in a different way, namely in a mediated way. However, God's cognition of singulars cannot occur in the way we have described while speaking of the human cognition of singulars. The human intellect actively "marks" individuals with the help of imagination (strictly speaking, imagination is no sensible faculty, but, like the senses, it comes into contact with material objects). Yet this cannot happen in the case of God. He possesses no imagination and has no contact with the material world. His cognition is purely intellectual, hence abstract. In other words, God cannot perform directly a cognitive act setting singular objects in a spatio-temporally determined intentional representation, since his cognizing intellect transcends time and space60. Human beings distinguish two perfectly similar individuals by placing them on two different intentional lines and producing in their mind an intentional opposition between their own intellect and either individual. By contrast, God does not directly perform any such operation of signatio or demonstratio, as Auriol calls it. Suggesting he does would mean debasing the divine intellect and equating it with the human one. Auriol's strategy to solve this impasse is the following. First, he claims that God performs no act of signatio of singular objects, and yet he knows all the actual or possible cognitive acts directed by all created intellects towards all existing singular objects, and he is the exemplar cause of each of them. Thus, Auriol believes he can ensure God's complete cognition of each sensible singular (individuum corporeum et quantum). The latter is not to be viewed as just an object that can be "marked" as singular (substratum quod demonstratur), but as a singular that is actually signatum by an act of the soul, i. e. set within a certain spatial and/or temporal representation by any cognitive faculty. Let us explain this by referring to language. God cognizes the simple concepts of existing things, expressed by nouns such as "man" or "stone". 60. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 4, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 22, 1117-1119; X, p. 820a, D-E). Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 229 But he also cognizes the composite concepts we get when we add a demonstrative adjective to a noun, and say "this man" or "this stone", thereby making particular what would otherwise remain general and indicating a specific object61. Second, Auriol claims – and this is arguably his most noteworthy thesis – that each quiddity, such as man or stone, contains countless signabilitates passivae, each of which represents a certain disposition or susceptibility to be marked as particular and determined. This signa bilitas passiva is the essential condition for something to become the object of an act of signatio by any cognitive faculty. This is particularly clear in the case of human beings. When human beings are cognizing a sensible object, their cognitive faculties connote, i. e. "mark", a sensible object at a second stage, in that they add to the simple concept formed at a first stage – and shared by all similar objects – those aspects identifying it as a particular object. Now, Auriol claims that God knows the signabilitas passiva of every specific abstract nature, such as man or stone, regardless and independently of any act of signatio. This means that God knows the disposition or susceptibility of each specific quiddity to be exemplified by different individuals. Yet his intellect does not directly "mark" each of them through a distinct intellectual act, for he does not recognize himself as the direct and appropriate similitudo of each individual 61. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 4, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 24-25, 1235-1246; X, p. 821b-822a, F-A): «Sic igitur patet quomodo Deus potest cognoscere individuum corporeum et quantum, non enim potest nisi intelligendo illud cum signatione, ut hunc lapidem vel illum florem. Cum signatione autem quam intellectus suus exerceat, hoc facere non potest [...] Intelligit ergo hunc lapidem et hunc florem, signatum signatione quam alius exercet, videlicet imaginatio vel sensus vel quae possibilis est exerceri, licet nullus actu exerceat. Cum enim omnis sensus et omnis sensatio, tam interior quam exterior, possibilis exempletur per divinam essentiam, quae est similitudo eminens omnium rerum, vel potius omnia eminenter, necesse est quod ipsa similitudo sit huius lapidis et illius, in quantum similitudo est lapidis particularis et signationis vel signabilitatis passivae, ita quod totum hoc coniunctum est immediate exemplatum distincte, nam sine signatione passiva distincte exemplari non potest». 230 Chiara Paladini signatum. However, through the many connotations of his essence he cognizes not only specific natures, but their dispositions to be individualised. Therefore, God cognizes individuals as well, if only in a mediated way. And through his single essence, he is the exemplar cause of each of them62. Within Auriol's system the divine essence turns out to be the only exemplar for the creation of both specific natures and individuals. Let us see now how this is possible according to Auriol. 5. Auriol's theory of exemplar causality as similtudo aequivoca As the doctrine of the ideas was the model by which God's rational and ordered creation was explained, Auriol must now formulate a new concept of exemplarity consonant with his conception of divine knowledge in order to uphold the principle of rational creation. If the only object of divine knowledge is Godhead, this must also be the only exemplar of all creatures and the sole ground of the multiplicity of forms present in reality. To develop an appropriate theory, in d. 35, q. 3 Auriol draws on Averroes. In order to preserve God's simplicity and perfection, Averroes claims that God only knows a unique object: his own 62. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 4, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 25, 1246-1257; X, p. 822a, A-C): «Praecedunt autem signationem aut signabilitatem passivam signationes activae omnium sensationum et imaginationum possibilium, quae etiam exemplantur, propter quod divinus intuitus ad essentiam terminatus attingit aequivalenter et aequipollenter hunc lapidem et hunc florem et omne signatum individuum constitutum ex sua signatione seu demonstratione et ex substrato quod demonstratur. Et apparet quod, licet individuum substratum attingat mediante signatione vel signabilitate passiva, tamen immediate totum attingit quicquid se tenet ex parte individui [...] Ex quo manifestum relinquitur quomodo Deus, intelligendo suam essentiam, non solum intelligit rerum omnium quiditates, immo signationes passivas earum in quolibet individuo, quamvis per intellectum suum illas non signet». Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 231 essence63. Auriol now attempts to argue in favour of Averroes's doctrine, as it enables him to explain how manifold creatures can arise from the knowledge of a single object. He can thereby create a new system that only envisages a single relationship of exemplarity: the one between the Godhead and the creatures, the similitudo aequivoca. Primarily Auriol accuses Aquinas of having misunderstood Averroes when he claimed that he had denied God the knowledge of creatures. According to Aquinas, Averroes had only accorded to God a universal and confused knowledge of beings, a scientia universalis, not particularis. For Auriol, by contrast, Averroes only wanted to deny God a direct knowledge of individuals. Auriol's argument runs as follows: according to Aristotle the expression "in universali" can be taken in two different ways, either as knowledge of species or as knowledge of individuals. In Auriol's opinion, in saying that God can only know universals, Averroes only wants to deny that God's intellectual act relates to individual creatures, as this would not be in accordance with divine perfection. But this does not mean that God would lack knowledge of the specific principles according to which creatures are created64. For Averroes knowledge of the species is sufficient to guarantee both divine perfection and God's knowledge of the world. An example from geometry serves to illustrate this: someone who knows that a triangle has three corners has no need to know all of the really existing triangles in order to better understand the form of a triangle65. 63. Averroes, Aristotelis metaphysicorum libri XIIII cum Averrois Cordubensis in eosdem commentariis et epitome, Theophrasti metaphysicorum liber, XII, c. 51, in Aristotelis Opera cum Averrois Commentariis, Venetiis 1562 (an. repr. Nachdruck Minerva, Frankfurt a. M. 1962), VIII, p. 337, B-C. 64. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 3, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 4, 164-171; X, p. 790a, B-C). 65. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 4, 196-204; X, p. 790b, B-C): «Qui enim scit quod omnis triangulus habet tres <angulos> aeque perfectam cognitionem habet de ista veritate, ac si discurreret per omnes triangulos qui sunt in 232 Chiara Paladini Although Auriol on the one hand tries to defend Averroes from the attacks of the theologians, on the other he must concede that Averroes was mistaken to deny that God has a complete knowledge of individuals66. Nonetheless he grants him the merit of having recognised that God can be the cause of all creatures through the knowledge of a single object, his own essence. The key moment for Auriol lies in the different conception of divine causality: for Auriol as much as for Averroes there needn't necessarily be a direct similarity between cause and effect. Take for example a body's heat, which is caused not only by fire, but also by stars and movement. The heat of fire remains the principle, which founds, regulates and measures each concrete manifestation of heat in natural bodies: it is their exemplar67 cause. Averroes' theory serves Auriol in order to reject the Aristotelian principle omne agens agit sibi simile, which claims that any cause always produces an effect somehow similar to itself and which the Scholastics applied to the relation of similarity between God and creation68. According to this pattern of creation, the effect pre-exists in the cause in the form of idea-exemplar, which serves as the model for the resulting creation, just as the project of a house in the mind of an architect is the pre-existing model, the foundation upon which the architect builds the house. Auriol's exemplarism, by contrast, does not entail a direct correspondence between archetype and copy, since there can be pulvere vel in aere vel in latere. Non enim accrescit sibi aliqua notitia quae faciat ad perfectionem. Si igitur Deus novit omnes veritates geometricas et mathematicas ac physicas, cognoscendo quidditates omnium specierum et earum proprietates, nihil ad eum sollicitari de individuis signatis, in quibus illae veritates particulariter designantur». 66. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 6, 294; X, p. 791b, F). 67. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 3, art. 1 (E-Scriptum, p. 5, 246-254; X, p. 791a, D-E). 68. Cfr. Thomas de Aquino, Summa contra Gentiles, II, c. 45, p. 372. Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 233 no correspondence at all between the divine essence and creatures, based on something holding between idea and ideatum. Inasmuch as one single form has to be the exemplar cause of all different beings, it follows that this form cannot exactly resembles any of them, for were it to accord with any one of them it could no longer correspond to the others. In order to represent all of them, it must represent no-one69. In order to explain this new model of exemplar causality, Auriol has to resort to the formula of aequivocatio. This presupposes no assimilatio of an idea, on the contrary it presupposes an "opposition", that is, a link between two termini that belong to different genera and kinds. Auriol thus claims that non est impossibile, nec repugnantiam aut contradictionem includens, quod sit aliqua forma quae, per suam simplicem rationem formalem, similitudo sit inter se dissimilium quidditatum et naturarum, similitudo tamen aequivoca et alterius speciei seu generis ab eo cuius est similitudo70. There is no contradiction in saying that there is a form that alone and in itself is the exemplar for manifold forms and specific natures that do not resemble one another. But this is only valid if we assume that this form is an equivocal exemplar, i. e. one that does not resemble the things for which it serves as exemplar. 69. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 14, 702-707; X, p. 797b, E): «Non enim ex eo quod est simillima uni quidditati tollitur quin possit alteri esse simillima, pro eo quod simul stat in similitudine quod sit quidditati primae simillima, aequivoce tamen, et cum hoc eidem dissimillima, alioquin non esset aequivoca, cum aequivocatio et dissimilitudo sint idem. <Unde> [Cum Vb] non plus repugnat similitudini quidditatis quod sit eidem dissimillima, quatinus est similitudo alterius dissimilis quidditatis, quam quod sit dissimillima, quatinus est aequivoca». On the concept of aequivocatio, see below. See also ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 12, 617-620; X, p. 796b, B) and d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 15, 744-747; X, 798a, F). 70. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 13, 663-666; X, p. 797a, D). 234 Chiara Paladini The difference between univocal, equivocal and analogical concepts71, systematically worked out in Aristotle's Categories72, was a tool of fundamental significance for the discussion of many philosophical and theological problems, including causality. The three possible ways of understanding a concept correspond to three different types of causality: (i) An univocal cause leads to an effect that is similar to itself and with which it shares the same nature and ratio, as in the case of human reproduction. Father and son resemble one another in that they are individuals of the same species. (ii) An equivocal cause by contrast brings about an effect whose form differs from its own, as in the case of heat and movement. The form of heat that results from movement is not preexistent in that movement. The movement and the heat generated do not share the same form, they are not of the same species and do not share the same ratio. But the heat in the movement and heat generated both belong to the genus of heat. (iii) An analogous cause is partially univocal and partially equivocal, as it produces an effect that has the same form as it, but the form has a different kind of being in the cause as it does in the effect. The most familiar example is that of the architect. The idea of the house exists in the mind of the architect, but the house has a different kind of being in his mind, i. e. the being of an idea, and in reality. In the Middle Ages, the meta71. On the linguistic level, the distinction between univocal, equivocal, and analogical expressions corresponds to the three ways in which a term can be understood when it designates a number of different subjects: 1) If it is used with the same meaning for all subjects that it designates, then it is univocal, as for example when one says "Socrates is a man" and "Plato is a man". In both cases "man" designates "rational living being". 2) If a term has a different meaning for each subject that it is used for, it is used equivocally, as for example in the case of "dog" which designates both the animal and the heavenly constellation. 3) If the term has different meanings in the different ways it is used, but if they are still to a certain extent related to one another, then it is used analogically, as for example when we speak of "health" regarding an animal or regarding food. In this case food is designated as "healthy" to the extent that it is in a causal relationship with the health of the animal. 72. Aristoteles, Praedicamenta, 1, 1a1-12. Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 235 phor of the architect was often used to explain the divine creation through ideas. By means of the model of equivocation, Auriol is able to contest precisely this traditional model of creation: equivocation requires no conformity of the being to an idea, so there is no contradiction in the fact that the single ratio of divinity is equivocally the exemplar cause of different forms. Such a contradiction only would obtain in a univocal relation, which involves a one-to-one relation of similarity between idea and ideatum, i. e. only when one wants to insist on the Platonic idea of correspondence between the being and the idea, which Auriol has sharply criticised73. 6. Concluding remarks In Auriol's new theory, Godhead is the sole terminus of the divine intellection and therefore the sole pattern of creation, similitudo eminens et aequivoca omnium naturarum. It is also an immediate similitudo74: the intermediaries in the process of creation, i. e. the ideas, 73. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 14, 720-733; X, p. 798a, B): «Sed manifestum est quod contradictio non sequitur in aequivoca similitudine, sed in univoca tantum. In univocis enim sequitur, si duo alba sunt similia tertio, quod sint similia inter se, pro eo quod similitudo fundatur super aliquo quod est eiusdem rationis in tribus. In aequivoca vero similitudine non fundatur assimilatio in aliquo quod sit eiusdem rationis. Nam [...] illud quod est similitudo rosae est alterius rationis a rosa, et per consequens dissimile specifice. Et propter hoc non sequitur, si sit similitudo alterius, utpote lapidis, quod lapis et rosa sint similia, quia sic sunt similia in tertio, quod illa realitas in qua similes sunt, vel potius quae est similitudo amborum, est etiam quaedam dissimilitudo amborum, nec est eiusdem rationis aliquid reperibile propter hoc in ambobus. Et ideo non infertur quod ambo illa sint similia, participando in se aliquid unum et idem, quod sit eiusdem rationis. Ergo manifestum est quod similitudo aequivoca, dum tamen non sit arctata, potest esse per unum et idem simplex similitudo expressa dissimilium quidditatum». 74. Ibidem, d. 35, q. 3, art. 2 (E-Scriptum, p. 13, 648-649; X, p. 797a, A): «Deus est similitudo rerum omnium absque omni habitudine media seu respectu»; d. 36, q. 2, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 18, 985-989; X, p. 854b, F). 236 Chiara Paladini of the tradition have now been replaced by divinity itself, which is in a direct relation with the creatures, as it is in itself forma primaria et principalis et primum exemplar75. The feature of imitability is granted to God's essence alone. Yet this essence resembles none of the creatures in particular, as then it could not serve as the exemplar for all creatures. Auriol unseats the principle of a direct correspondence between ideatum and idea, which dates back to Augustine. In its place the relationship that links the creatures to God is defined as similitudo aequivoca. The doctrine of similitudo aequivoca represents the swansong of the traditional concept of exemplar causality, which required a univocal correspondence between ideas and entities. This also constitutes a turning away from the view that the world was created according to immutable, pre-existing models in God. The use of connotation enables Auriol to safeguard the divine knowledge of creatures. In recto God indeed knows only himself. But although the divine ratio is simple and undivided, it is still connoted with various meanings, which in turn refer to the creatures. Thereby the multiplicity of beings is also known by God, without the mediation of the ideas. But the elimination of the ideas as the media of the cognitive process at once entails the elimination of media from the process of creation too: the various connotations, which safeguard the divine knowledge of creatures, ultimately play no role in creation. They exclusively serve God's knowledge of creatures. But the sole exemplar for creation remains God's es75. Ibidem, d. 36, q. 2, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 18, 972-981; X, p. 854b, D): «Est enim inconcusse tenendum quod tota ratio exemplaritatis et ideae residet in ratione deitatis [...] et per consequens deitas est omnium similitudo primaria et forma principalis, ut sic cadat omnis imaginatio et illorum qui opinantur quiditates ut cognitas habere rationem ideae et illorum qui dicunt hoc de respectibus imitabilitatum et eorum qui dicunt de rationibus absolutis circa divinam essentiam intellectis aut existentibus ex natura rei». Exemplar Causality as similitudo aequivoca in Peter Auriol 237 sence. The connotations are not models, according to which God created the world, they are not specific rationes, that are the ground, ante rem, of the differences given in material reality. As Perler has claimed, the esse obiectivum, which Auriol maintains in his theory, is no longer that on the basis of which each being is what it is and is knowable as such, as it was for Scotus. It is no longer the result of the divine production of the ideas, which are the eternal principles of the intelligibility of extra-mental things. It is rather a modus essendi of the present object of knowledge, which only arises when it appears to the knower76. The divine knowledge of creatures, as conceived by Auriol, seems instead to be close related with a form of actual existence of the world. It is not because it first becomes known through ideas that every being is then created, it is rather because things are actually known by God that they immediately conform to the divine essence: creaturae prout existunt in rerum natura, imitantur immediate deitatem et exemplantur ab ea; illud enim idem attingit deitas secundum rationem causae exemplaris quod attingit ut efficiens et ut finis, et aeque immediate. Est autem finis et efficiens creaturarum secundum esse extra, non quidem mediante esse cognito earumdem, immo immediate, quare et erit exemplar ipsarum immediate. Unde creaturae non solum ut intellectae, immo ut existentes, sunt quaedam similitudines diminutae ipsius. Et confirmatur quia creatus artifex per eandem similitudinem existentem in intellectu speculatur immediate formam arcae, et ipsam in materia immediate operatur. Unde forma domus existens in materia non solum similis est eidem formae relucenti obiective in mente artificis, immo ambae similes sunt speciei existenti formaliter in eius intellectu; et per consequens illa species habet rationem primarii exemplaris; utraque vero forma rationem ideati et exemplati. Et eodem modo intelligendum est in divinis.77 76. Cfr. Perler, What Am I Thinking About?, pp. 72-89. 77. Petrus Aureoli, Scriptum, d. 36, q. 2, art. 3 (E-Scriptum, p. 19, 989-20, 1000; X, p. 855a, A-B). 238 Chiara Paladini Auriol's new concept of exemplar cause doesn't envisage any preexistent models for creation. The esse obiectivum of the house only arises when to the intentional act of the intellect, in which the architect imagines the house, the appearing being of the object, i. e. the house is added. Only then do they both, the subjective act of the intellect and the object, conform to the esse apparens, i. e. the esse obiectivum of the real existing object. Only then does knowledge occur. It is the same in the divine sphere: the apparentiae obiectivae, in which God knows the creatures, only arise when the creatures actually appear to God. In other words, the apparentiae obiectivae are nothing else than the (at a specific point in time) real existing creatures insofar as they are actually known by God from all eternity, as abstracted from all time78. 78. In order to avoid divine necessitarianism and preserve human freedom, Auriol develops an innovative theory on future contingents and divine foreknowledge. On this see C. Normore, Future Contingents, in N. Kretzmann, A. Kenny, J. Pinborg (ed. by), The Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1982, pp. 358-81: 369-370; Id., Petrus Aureoli and his Contemporaries on Future Contingents and Excluded Middle, «Synthese» 96 (1993), pp. 83-92; C. Schabel, The Quarrel with Aureol: Peter Aureol's Role in the Late-Medieval Debate over Divine Foreknowledge and Future Contingents, 1315-1475, Ph.D. dissertation defended in 1994 at the University of Iowa; Id. Peter Aureol on Divine Foreknowledge and Future Contingents: Scriptum in Primum Sententiarum, distinctions 38-39, «Cahiers de l'Institut du Moyen Age Grec et Latin» 65 (1995), pp. 63-212; Id., Peter de Rivo and the Quarrel over Future Contingents: New Evidence and New Perspectives, «Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale» 6 (1995), pp. 363-473; 7 (1996), pp. 369475; Id., Theology at Paris 1316-1345. Peter Auriol and the Problem of Divine Foreknowledge and Future Contingents, Ashgate, Aldershot 2000; R.L. Friedman, C. Schabel, I. Balcoyiannopoulou, Peter of Palude and the Parisian Reaction to Durand of St. Pourcain on Future Contingents, «Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum» 71 (2001), pp. 183-300; M. Thakkar, Peter Auriol and the Logic of the Future, Ph.D. dissertation defended in 2010 at the University of Oxford.