Program / Course 8: God, Trinity, and Creation / Lesson 2.1
What you will learn
- State the doctrine of divine simplicity in plain terms and distinguish it from the claim that God is easy to understand.
- Explain the main reasons given for it from Scripture and philosophy.
- Describe the strongest objections, including the problem of the Trinity and the problem of distinct attributes.
- Summarize how Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant thinkers have treated the doctrine.
The big idea
Divine simplicity is the teaching that God is not made up of parts. God is not a body, not a combination of matter and form, and not a being who has goodness or power as separate items added on. In God, what God is and that God is are one, and God’s goodness, wisdom and power are not different things. The doctrine is demanding and has been debated for centuries. It is held in some form by most classical Christian writers, and it is questioned by many modern ones.
Key terms
- Simplicity
- Being without parts or composition. It does not mean being easy or plain.
- Composition
- Being made of parts, such as body and soul, matter and form, or a thing and its properties.
- Essence
- What a thing is, the nature that makes it the kind of thing it is.
- Existence
- That a thing is, as opposed to what it is. In creatures the two are distinct. The tradition says that in God they are one.
- Attribute
- A quality said of God, such as goodness, wisdom or power.
- Property
- A quality that something has. Many modern philosophers use the word to describe features that can belong to more than one thing.
- Abstract and concrete
- A concrete thing can be pointed to, like a person. An abstract thing, like goodness, is a quality or kind. Critics ask whether God can be both a person and a quality.
- Perichoresis
- A Greek term for the mutual indwelling of the three persons of the Trinity, used by later Eastern writers.
Background
Almost every created thing is made of parts. A tree has roots and leaves. A person has a body and a soul. Even something very simple, like an atom, has a nature and an act of existing which could in principle be distinguished. Whatever is made of parts depends on those parts and could in theory be taken apart. If God is the source of everything and depends on nothing, then it seems that God cannot be made in this way.
This reasoning appears early. Irenaeus and other fathers said that God is not composed and not divided. Augustine wrote that in God to be and to be wise are the same (City of God XI.10). John of Damascus said that the divine is simple and uncompounded. The medieval peak is in Aquinas, who devoted Question 3 of the Summa Theologiae to simplicity and used it as the basis for much that follows. The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 and the First Vatican Council in 1870 describe God as simple, using the term in official teaching.
Many Protestant confessions say the same. The Westminster Confession says God is without body, parts or passions. The Belgic Confession speaks of God as simple and spiritual. In the twentieth century many philosophers began to criticize the doctrine as incoherent or unbiblical, while others, including philosophers of different faiths, have defended it. It is therefore both an old consensus and a lively debate.
Step-by-step explanation
Step 1: What the doctrine says
Aquinas lists several denials. God is not a body, since bodies have parts. God is not a composite of matter and form, since matter implies potential to be changed. God is not a composite of nature and individual, as a man is both human nature and this particular man. God is not a composite of essence and existence, as creatures are. And God is not a composite of substance and accidents, meaning that God does not have qualities that could be there or not there.
From these denials the positive teaching follows. God’s goodness is God. God’s wisdom is God. God’s power is God. These are not three things in God. They are one reality described in three ways, because human minds cannot grasp it at once. The tradition says that the names differ in meaning for us but not in what they refer to in God.
Step 2: Why defenders hold it
The first reason is dependence. If God had parts, God would depend on them, and so on something other than God. That would make God less than the ultimate source. The second reason is that God is the cause of everything else, and a cause of that kind has to be fully actual, with no unrealized possibility. The third is that Scripture calls God light (1 John 1:5) and love (1 John 4:8), not just one who has light or love. Defenders say this fits the idea that God does not merely have goodness but is the goodness of which created goods are copies.
Some philosophers add another argument. If God had properties that are distinct from God, those properties would be something else, and God would owe what God is to them. Whatever one thinks of this, it shows why even careful modern philosophers consider the question serious.
Step 3: The strongest objections
The first objection is that if all of God’s attributes are identical, then God’s power is the same as God’s knowledge and God’s justice is the same as God’s mercy. They seem to be different things, so the doctrine seems to make them collapse. Defenders reply that the attributes are distinct in meaning but one in reality, in the way a person might see one object from different angles. Critics say this does not help, since the identity of the things themselves is the problem.
The second objection, pressed by Alvin Plantinga and others, is that if God is identical to God’s nature, then God is a property, and a property cannot create the world or love anyone. Defenders say this assumes a model of things and properties that does not apply to God, who is not an item of a kind. A third objection is that simplicity seems to conflict with the Trinity, since there are three persons in God. Defenders answer that the persons are distinguished by relations, not by parts, and that Augustine and Aquinas worked out the doctrine of simplicity and the Trinity together. Critics are not all satisfied.
A fourth objection, made by some biblical scholars, is that simplicity is a philosophical claim not found in the Bible. Defenders reply that the Bible is the source of the claims about God’s oneness and independence, and that simplicity states in philosophical language what follows from them. This is a difference about method as much as content.
Step 4: Two ways to hold it
Some theologians hold a strong version, in which every attribute is literally identical with God’s essence and with each other. Others hold a weaker version, in which God has no separable parts, no body, no unrealized possibilities, and does not depend on anything, without requiring that all attributes be strictly identical. The weaker version keeps the main purpose of the doctrine, which is to deny that God is put together. Whether it is enough is itself debated.
- What would it mean for God to depend on something outside himself?
- Do I think of God’s attributes as separate items, like tools in a box?
- Is the claim that God is goodness itself a comfort or a puzzle to me?
- Which objection do I find most serious, and why?
- How would I explain simplicity to someone who thinks it means that God is plain or easy?
- Would I hold the strong or the weak version, and what would be lost in each?
Examples
A composed thing
A human being has a body and a soul, a nature and a particular existence, and qualities such as being tall or kind that could be otherwise. Each of these distinctions marks a way in which a human being is put together. Simplicity says that none of them applies to God.
Light and lamps
A lamp has light, but the light is not the lamp. Scripture says that God is light (1 John 1:5). Defenders of simplicity take this to mean that God does not have light as an addition. God is the source of all light and is not a thing that holds light.
The Trinity
In the Nicene faith there are three persons and one God. If persons were parts, the doctrine would be broken. Augustine and Aquinas argued that the persons are distinguished by their relations, the Father as origin, the Son as begotten, the Spirit as proceeding, and not by parts.
Different perspectives
Catholic
Catholic teaching has accepted simplicity firmly. Aquinas gives its most complete form, and Vatican I called God a simple and unchangeable spiritual substance. Some Catholic theologians today try to state the doctrine in more modern terms, but its place in official teaching is secure.
Orthodox
Orthodox theology accepts that God is simple, but joins it to the distinction between essence and energies. The Palamite tradition holds that this distinction is real and yet does not divide God. Some Western critics doubt this can be squared with simplicity, and Orthodox writers reply that the distinction is between God and God’s activity, not between parts.
Protestant
The Reformed confessions and Lutheran writers held simplicity, as in the Westminster Confession’s phrase without body, parts or passions. In recent years Protestant philosophers have been divided. Some, like Plantinga, have raised hard objections, while others, such as scholars in the Reformed scholastic tradition, defend it as biblical.
Jewish and Islamic
Maimonides in the Jewish tradition and many Islamic theologians also held that God has no parts or composition. This is one source of Aquinas’s argument. The shared view across the three faiths is often seen by scholars as a sign of how deeply the idea is rooted in monotheistic reflection.
Contemporary philosophical views
Some analytic philosophers regard simplicity as incoherent and propose that God has real properties and real parts of a sort, such as a mind with several powers. Others, including a number of nonbelievers who study the argument, think the doctrine is more coherent than critics allow. There is no consensus.
Why it matters
The doctrine is not a technical hobby. It affects how Christians understand God’s love, God’s independence and the Trinity. If simplicity is true, then God’s goodness is not a standard outside God that God measures up to. If it is false, some of the arguments of the classical tradition lose their footing. Whichever way a student decides, knowing what the doctrine claims keeps the discussion honest and prevents confusing it with the claim that God is plain.
Common misunderstandings
Misunderstanding: Simplicity means God is easy to understand.
Correction: The word means without parts. The tradition insists that God exceeds human understanding. The doctrine itself is demanding to grasp.
Misunderstanding: Simplicity makes the Trinity impossible.
Correction: Classical writers argued the reverse: the persons are distinguished by relations, which are not parts. Critics may still find the argument unconvincing, but it was part of the tradition from Augustine onward.
Misunderstanding: Simplicity is found in a Bible verse.
Correction: No verse states it. The doctrine is an inference from scriptural teaching about God’s oneness, independence and perfection. Whether the inference is sound is the question.
Misunderstanding: If God’s attributes are all the same, then mercy and justice are the same.
Correction: The doctrine holds that they are one in God but different as they appear to creatures and in their effects. Whether this fully answers the objection is argued among scholars.
Knowledge check
What does divine simplicity mean?
It means God is not composed of parts: not body and soul, not matter and form, not a thing plus its qualities, and not essence distinct from existence. God’s goodness, wisdom and power are one reality in God. The word does not mean easy to understand.
Give one reason defenders offer for the doctrine.
If God had parts, God would depend on them and so on something other than God, which would make God less than the ultimate source. Another reason is that a first cause must be fully actual, with no unrealized possibility. A third is that Scripture says God is light and love, not only that God has them.
State one objection to simplicity and one reply.
Objection: if all of God’s attributes are identical, then God’s justice and mercy seem to collapse into one. Reply: the attributes are different in meaning for human minds but one in the reality they describe, much as different descriptions can pick out one thing. Critics say this does not fully answer the problem.
How do defenders reconcile simplicity with the Trinity?
They hold that the three persons are distinguished by relations of origin, the Father unbegotten, the Son begotten and the Spirit proceeding, and not by parts. The persons share one divine essence. Augustine and Aquinas developed both doctrines together. Critics remain unsure whether this is fully coherent.
Think it through
- Does the idea that God does not have goodness but is goodness help you think about moral questions?
- Which would you rather give up, a strong simplicity or the claim that God’s attributes are real distinct features of God?
- Why might a doctrine like this matter to someone who is not a philosopher?
Independent assignment
Reading Question 3
In your own notebook, write about 500 words. Read the first two articles of Question 3 in Part I of Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae, on whether God is a body and whether God is composed of matter and form. Summarize one argument in your own words. Then state one objection from this lesson and say whether the argument answers it. Do not send this to anyone.
Further study
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Divine Simplicity Read for a clear map of the doctrine and the objections.
- Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Read Part I, Question 3, on the simplicity of God.
- Augustine of Hippo, The City of God See Book XI, chapter 10, for Augustine on the simple good.
- John of Damascus, An Exposition of the Orthodox Faith Read the early chapters on the Eastern statement that God is uncompounded.
- Westminster Assembly, The Westminster Confession of Faith Read chapter 2 for the Reformed statement.
- 1 John 1:5 God is light.
- 1 John 4:8 God is love.
- James 1:17 The Father of lights, with whom is no variableness.