Disputatio VII: De Participatione et Ontologia Theoseos

On Participation and the Ontology of Theosis

Participatio est nexus ontologicus inter creaturam et Deum, per quem homo fit particeps naturae divinae non per essentiae confusionem sed per gratiam communicationis. Ontologia theoseos describit modum huius participationis, qua Spiritus Sanctus causat realem communionem inter divinum et humanum.

Participation is the ontological bond between creature and Creator, through which the human being becomes a partaker of the divine nature—not by confusion of essence, but by the grace of communication. The ontology of theosis describes the mode of this participation, wherein the Holy Spirit causes a real communion between the divine and the human.

Thesis

Theosis, or deification, is not simply a metaphorical elevation but a real participation in divine being. This participation occurs through the Holy Spirit, who causally unites the finite and infinite without mixture of essences. Ontologically, participation (participatio) is a relation of dependence and transformation in that the creature truly shares in divine perfections while remaining creaturely.

Locus classicus

“He has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature.” — 2 Peter 1:4

Here Scripture itself uses the language of participation (koinōnoi theias physeōs). Theosis is not a pious metaphor but a scriptural assertion: believers truly partake of divine life, though not of divine essence.

Explicatio

If in Disputatio VI we saw that divine causality extends into speech, here we see that it extends into being. The Spirit who authorizes theology’s words also constitutes theology’s subjects.
To be Christian is to live in participatione Dei—to exist by sharing in what belongs properly to God.

Let us recall our earlier notation and make it fully clear.

• D_G designates a divine property as it exists in God (for example, righteousness, wisdom, or love).

• D designates the participated correlate of that divine property as it exists in the believer by grace. Thus, when we say D_G → D, we mean that God’s own property (say, divine righteousness) communicates itself to the creature as participated righteousness.
  This arrow “→” is not a mechanical transmission but symbolizes the Spirit’s causal act of mediation—the gift by which divine life becomes creaturely without ceasing to be divine.

Participation, therefore, is neither an abstract analogy nor a pantheistic fusion. It is an ontological relation in which divine causality constitutes new being in the creature.
The believer does not merely imitate God; he is made new by receiving within himself a correlate of God’s own perfection. This is the real ontology of deification.

In formal theological terms, we might say:

• The relation of participation is two-sorted: it joins distinct orders of being, the divine and the creaturely.

• It is asymmetrical: the creature participates in God, never God in the creature.

• It is personal and pneumatic—mediated by the Spirit, who unites without confusion.

Theosis thus represents the ontological depth of salvation: the Spirit’s causality does not merely declare righteousness but constitutes it.

Objectiones

Obiectio I. Participation implies that the creature shares in the divine essence, which contradicts the Creator–creature distinction.

Obiectio II. If divine properties are communicated, they seem multiplied; there would then be many instances of God’s attributes, violating divine simplicity.

Obiectio III. Theosis makes salvation a metaphysical transformation rather than an act of grace received by faith alone.

Responsiones

Ad I. Participation does not entail identity of essence but communion of life. The creature remains distinct, but receives existence and renewal from the divine act. As Luther said, “Faith unites the soul with Christ as a bride is united to her bridegroom.” The union is real but not essential.

Ad II. Divine attributes are not multiplied but refracted. The same divine righteousness that exists uncreated in God exists createdly in the believer. The distinction is not between two righteousnesses, but between two modes of the same causal source—one infinite, one finite.

Ad III. Faith is the mode by which participation occurs, not its substitute. To believe is to receive, and what faith receives is nothing less than divine life. Theosis therefore fulfills sola fide: faith justifies because it unites the believer to Christ, and that union is participation itself.

Nota

The ontology of theosis clarifies how theological realism must be understood. To say that salvation is participation is to assert that grace is ontological causation, not merely external favor. When God declares the sinner righteous, He causes righteousness to exist in that person as participation in His own righteousness.

This participatory realism avoids both the extremes of nominalism and pantheism. Against nominalism, it maintains that grace effects real transformation; against pantheism, it preserves the Creator–creature distinction. The medium of this relation is the Spirit, who is both divine presence and causal agent.

The structure of participation may thus be expressed symbolically (and then immediately explained):

S participates in D, where S is the human subject and D the participated property derived from God’s own D_G. This means: the believer’s new dispositions (faith, hope, love) are not self-generated moral habits but gifts of divine life.

The ontological grammar of theosis therefore complements the syntactical grammar of theology. Just as words become true when authorized by the Spirit, persons become real when constituted by that same Spirit’s causality. The Spirit is the bridge across both language and being.

Determinatio

From the foregoing it is determined that:

1. Theosis is the ontological form of salvation: the creature’s participation in divine life through the Spirit.

2. Participation (participatio) expresses an asymmetrical relation—God communicates, the creature receives.

3. The Holy Spirit is the causal mediator of this participation, uniting Creator and creature without confusion or separation.

4. Divine properties (D_G) are communicated not as multiplied essences but as participated correlates (D) in the believer.

5. The ontology of theosis thus completes the logic of divine communication: the Word spoken truly becomes the life lived divinely.

Transitus ad Disputationem VIII

Faith, as participatory knowledge, binds intellect and will to the truth of the Word. Yet theological knowledge also claims universality and coherence; it seeks not only to believe but to understand. How, then, is theology related to reason as science?

This question leads to Disputatio VIII: De Theologia ut Scientia Subalternata, where we examine whether theology possesses a demonstrative structure, and in what sense divine illumination subordinates or perfects reason.

Disputatio VI: De Causalitate Divina et Loquela Theologica

On Divine Causality and Theological Speech

Quaeritur

Causalitas divina non est externa actio super mundum, sed interna ratio essendi et loquendi. Spiritus Sanctus, qui est amor subsistens, causat non solum esse rerum sed etiam recte loqui de Deo. Sic omnis loquela theologica est participatio in causatione divina.

Divine causality is not an external action imposed upon the world but the inner reason both for being and for speaking. The Holy Spirit, who is subsistent love, causes not only the existence of things but also the right speaking of them. Every theological utterance is thus a participation in divine causality itself.

Thesis

The Spirit’s causality extends from being to language. The God who causes things to exist also causes them to be spoken truly. Hence, theological language is not merely a human representation of divine acts but itself a divinely caused act of participation in those same realities.

Locus classicus

“For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” — Philippians 2:13

Here Paul affirms that divine causality penetrates human willing and acting. The same holds for speech: God works in us not only to do but to say according to His good pleasure.

Explicatio

In the preceding Disputationes, we established that theological speech (T) is syntactically ordered, Spirit-authorized, and rendered true through its correspondence with divine reality. Yet this correspondence itself presupposes a causal link: the reality that theology names exists only because God brings it into being, and the speech that names it exists only because God causes it to be spoken.

Divine causality therefore operates on two planes:

1. Ontological causality, whereby God gives being to creatures.

2. Linguistic causality, whereby God gives utterance to truth-bearing speech.

Both forms of causation are united in the Holy Spirit, the divine causa principalissima — the first and inner cause through whom all other causes act.

To express this relation in our earlier symbolism:

• Let D_G represent a property belonging properly to God (for example, divine wisdom).

• Let D represent the creature’s participated share in that property (human wisdom given by grace).

When theology speaks of “wisdom,” its words participate in the same causal current by which divine wisdom communicates itself to creatures. Thus, the correspondence D_G → D (read: “from God’s wisdom to creaturely wisdom”) does not indicate a metaphor but a causal transmission—the Spirit’s act of sharing divine properties across the Creator–creature divide.

Accordingly, theology’s language is not neutral description but theophysical communication—a speech that exists because God causes it to exist as part of His ongoing self-disclosure.

Objectiones

Obiectio I. According to Aristotelian naturalism, divine causality, operates only through the natural order as its first cause. Human speech, being a voluntary act of rational creatures, belongs to the realm of secondary causes. To make God the cause of theological language would collapse creaturely agency and render human discourse a mere divine puppet show.

Obiectio II. According to late medieval nominalist voluntarism, God’s will alone determines what is true, but human language cannot share in that causality. The words of theology are human signs that express obedience, not divine acts themselves. To attribute causal efficacy to them confuses sign with thing and diminishes God’s absolute freedom.

Obiectio III. If God directly causes every act as in occasionalism, then human beings contribute nothing real to theological speech. But if humans truly speak, then divine causality cannot determine their words without destroying their freedom. The doctrine of divine causation in theological discourse thus faces an insoluble dilemma: either language is divine and not human, or human and not divine.

Obiectio IV. Contemporary analytic philosophy of language regards meaning as determined by social-linguistic conventions and intentions, not metaphysical causes. “Causality” has no place in semantic explanation. To describe divine causality in theological speech is therefore a category mistake, a misuse of causal vocabulary in the domain of meaning.

Responsiones

Ad I. Aristotle’s distinction between primary and secondary causes provides the very structure theology must preserve. The Holy Spirit acts as the primary cause of theological language, not by replacing human agency but by enabling it. Just as God moves creatures to act according to their own natures, so the Spirit moves theologians to speak according to their own intellects and tongues. Divine causality grounds, rather than negates, the freedom of theological speech.

Ad II. Nominalism rightly guards divine sovereignty, yet by confining causality to decree it denies God’s intimate presence in creation. The Spirit’s causality in theological language is not competitive but participatory: divine agency establishes the very possibility that human words can signify God. Theological language is not deified but divinely grounded—the Spirit makes creaturely signs transparent to divine reality without abolishing their created nature.

Ad III. The dilemma between occasionalism and autonomy arises only when divine and human causality are conceived as rival forces within the same ontological plane. In theology, however, divine causality is in esse—it grounds the creature’s act without competing with it. The human theologian truly speaks, yet that speech is what it is by virtue of the Spirit’s enabling presence. Divine causality does not override secondary causes but constitutes their being and efficacy.

Ad IV. Analytic semantics rightly locates meaning within communal use, but this use itself presupposes a deeper ontological ground. In theology, the relation between word and referent is not purely conventional but pneumatic: the Spirit causes words to bear determinate reference to divine reality. Theological meaning therefore involves both human convention and divine causation—the Spirit as the transcendent condition of linguistic signification in the domain of revelation.

Nota

The connection between causality and language clarifies theology’s realism. If “to be is to have causal powers,” as philosophers often say, then to speak truly of God requires that theological terms participate in divine causal power. The Spirit ensures this participation by joining word and world in a single act of communication.

We might say that felicity is the form of divine causality in speech. When the Spirit authorizes an utterance within T, He does more than declare it permissible; He makes it effective as a bearer of divine power. The felicitous word, therefore, is not merely correct but causal—it accomplishes what it signifies because it lives in the Spirit’s energy.

This understanding also guards against theological irrealism. A theology that speaks of God without causal reference—without affirming that God’s acts truly bring about what is said—would empty divine predicates of power. The Spirit, as cause of both being and saying, guarantees that theological truth is not detached commentary but participation in divine action.

Determinatio

From the foregoing it is determined that:

1. Divine causality operates not only in the order of being but also in the order of speaking.

2. The Holy Spirit is the principal cause of all felicitous and truthful theological utterance.

3. To speak truly of God is to participate causally in God’s own self-communication; theology is therefore a theophysical act.

4. Felicity represents the formal aspect of divine causality in language, while truth represents its ontological fulfillment.

5. The Spirit thus binds ontology and discourse in a single causal order: the God who causes being to exist also causes His praise to be spoken.

Transitus ad Disputationem VII

Having found that revelation unfolds as act and word within history, it remains to ask how the human response in faith becomes a mode of knowing. Is faith an assent of intellect, a movement of will, or a participation in divine understanding?

To address this we turn to Disputatio VII: De Fide ut Participatione Intellectus Divini, in which it is asked how faith unites epistemic humility with ontological participation such that the believer is made a knower within the light of God.

Disputatio IV: De Veritate Theologiae Duplex

On the Twofold Truth of Theology

Quaeritur

Veritas theologiae duplicem habet formam: internam, quae consistit in felicitate Spiritu data intra linguam fidei (T), et externam, quae consistit in adaequatione huius linguae ad esse divinitus constitutum. Hae duae veritates, distinctae sed ordinatae, in Christo, qui est Verbum et Res, uniuntur.

We might speak of the truth of theology as twofold. There is internal truth, which consists in Spirit-given felicity within the language of faith T, and external truth, which consists in the adequation of that language to the reality constituted by God. The two are distinct but ordered to one another, and they find their unity in Christ, who is both Word and Reality.

Thesis

Theology possesses both an internal and an external truth.

• Internal truth (veritas interna) refers to the coherence and felicity of theological speech as governed by the Spirit within the community of faith.

• External truth (veritas externa) pertains to the correspondence or adequacy of that speech when interpreted within being, its fulfillment in the order of reality that God creates and sustains.
  Together they form a single movement from faith’s language to God’s reality and back again.

Locus classicus

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” — John 14:6

In this saying, Christ names Himself not merely as speaker of truth but as Truth itself. The theological word thus possesses two dimensions: it is true in faith because it participates in Christ’s own utterance, and it is true in being because Christ Himself is what the Word declares.

Explicatio

In previous disputations, theology was described as a formal language T, authorized by the Spirit, and interpreted within models that link language to being. Here we consider what it means to say that such theological expressions are true.

In logic, truth is often defined by correspondence: a sentence is true when what it says obtains in the world. In theology, that notion must be qualified. Theology’s words do not first describe and then verify; they participate in divine speech.

To express this participation, we distinguish between two levels of truth:

1. Internal truth (veritas interna) occurs within the system of theological language itself. We might say that a tatement is internally true when it is felicitous, when it coheres with Scripture, doctrine, and Spirit-guided discourse. For instance, “Christ is Lord” is internally true because it is consonant with the grammar of faith T as the Spirit has given it.

   Symbolically, we may call the internal measure of this truth FT, the felicity conditions of T. These conditions ensure that theology speaks rightly, even before modeling connects it to being.

2. External truth (veritas externa) arises when the same expression is interpreted within a model of reality M, yielding what we earlier called TC, or truth conditions. These are the states of affairs, the real relations, events, or properties through which God’s Word is fulfilled in the world.

   In simple terms: FT + Modeling = TC. That is, when Spirit-given felicity joins ontological adequacy, the statement is true in both faith and fact.

This distinction does not divide truth into two different kinds but shows its two dimensions. Internal truth without external fulfillment is mere coherence; external truth without inner authorization is unfettered speculation. Only when the Spirit unites both does theology achieve full truth.

Objectiones

Obiectio I. Thomas Aquinas maintains that truth is the adequation of intellect and thing (adaequatio intellectus et rei). Theology, insofar as it concerns divine things, must therefore have a single, objective truth grounded in God’s being. To posit a “double truth” in theology would divide divine reality from its cognition and collapse truth into mere human interpretation.

Obiectio II. Late medieval nominalism holds that theological statements possess truth only insofar as they express the divine will revealed in Scripture. There is no ontological correspondence beyond God’s voluntary decree. To speak of an “ontological truth” in addition to a “formal” or linguistic one is to reintroduce metaphysical realism against the simplicity of God’s sovereignty.

Obiectio III. For Kant, all human knowledge is conditioned by the forms of intuition and categories of the understanding. “Theology” may express moral faith but cannot claim objective correspondence to the divine. Any “double truth” distinguishing linguistic coherence from ontological reality confuses the distinction between phenomena and noumena. The only truth theology can have is practical, not ontological.

Obiectio IV. George Lindbeck and others argue that theological truth resides within the coherence of a community’s grammar. There is no “ontological truth” to be accessed beyond the language of faith. To posit a second, deeper truth is to reintroduce the very representationalism Lindbeck rejects. Theological truth is singular and intralinguistic; there is no duplex veritas.

Obiectio V. From a constructivist or deconstructive standpoint, all claims to “truth” are historically contingent linguistic performances. A “double truth” merely multiplies illusions. Theology’s so-called ontological truth is only a higher-order fiction meant to stabilize its discourse. Truth is produced, not revealed.

Responsiones

Ad I. Thomistic realism correctly grounds truth in the relation between intellect and being, yet theology’s intellect is not autonomous but pneumatic. Its formal truth, the coherence and intelligibility of theological language, is secured within the human domain. Its ontological truth, the correspondence of that language to divine reality, is effected by the Holy Spirit, who bridges word and being. These two aspects are not contradictory but correlative; the Spirit makes the formal act of saying coincide with the divine act of being.

Ad II. Nominalism preserves God’s freedom but severs divine willing from ontological intelligibility. The “double truth” of theology does not undermine divine sovereignty; it clarifies its modes of manifestation. God’s will becomes present formally in the human act of confession and ontologically in the reality the confession names. The Spirit unites both, ensuring that what is truly said in faith corresponds to how God truly is, and without collapsing divine causality into human speech.

Ad III. While Kant’s distinction between phenomena and noumena limits knowledge to the conditions of human sensibility, theological truth concerns divine communication. The Spirit renders finite intellects proportionate to divine truth without violating their transcendental structure. The duplex truth of theology honors both sides: the formal truth proper to human language and the ontological truth granted by divine participation. Revelation transforms the limits of reason into avenues of communion.

Ad IV. Post-liberal theology rightly emphasizes the communal and grammatical dimensions of faith, but its refusal of ontological reference renders theology self-enclosed. The double truth affirms that grammar and reality are distinct yet related: theological statements are formally true as expressions within a rule-governed practice, and ontologically true insofar as that practice participates in divine being through the Spirit. The grammar of faith is sacramental; it mediates what it signifies.

Ad V. Constructivism dissolves truth into performance, yet it inadvertently testifies to a real difference between the act of speaking and what the act seeks to convey. The duplex truth acknowledges that difference while grounding it in divine causality. The Spirit authorizes human constructions as instruments of revelation, preserving their historical finitude while ensuring participation in the eternal. Theological truth is neither illusion nor production but participation in a Word that precedes every word.

Nota

Picture the unity of these two truths as a circle rather than a line. Theological language begins with T, the grammar given by the Spirit. Within T, internal truth arises through faithful speech. This language is then modeled into reality M, producing external truth as divine being answers divine word. The resulting adequacy returns again to renew T, forming a continual exchange between language and being, grace and truth.

When theologians write FT + Modeling = TC, they are not composing an equation but naming a semantic reality: felicity (Spirit-authorized speech) joined to modeling (Spirit-interpreted being) yields theological truth. It is a symbolic shorthand for Luther’s claim that God’s Word is true because it does what it says.

Christ Himself is this coincidence of internal and external truth, the Word that is also the world’s fulfillment. To confess that “the Word became flesh” is to say that God’s internal Word (eternally spoken) has become externally real in history.

Determinatio

From the foregoing it is determined that:

1. Theology possesses both an internal truth (felicity within the Spirit-governed language of faith) and an external truth (adequacy to divine reality).

2. These two are ordered, not opposed: internal truth grounds theology’s faithfulness, external truth secures its realism.

3. Christ, as both Word and Reality, is the unity of these two modes of truth.

4. The Spirit mediates their conjunction, ensuring that the truth of faith is neither abstract nor speculative but living and enacted.

5. Hence, theology’s veracity is neither purely linguistic nor purely ontological; it is incarnational, the meeting of speech and being in the Spirit of Christ.

Transitus ad Disputationem V

We have learned that the truth of theological speech depends not on symbol or metaphor alone, but on a real participation in what it names. Yet participation itself demands clarification, for by what mode does the finite partake in the infinite without confusion or separation?

Therefore, we proceed to Disputatio V: De Participatione Entis et Causā Divinā, wherein we inquire how created being stands in relation to the Creator. Is the relation one of imitation, dependence, or an active share in the divine act of existence? 

Disputatio III: De Spiritu Sancto et Finitudine Felicitatis

On the Holy Spirit and the Boundary of Felicity

Quaeritur

Spiritus Sanctus est ille qui determinat fines sermonis theologicis, discernens inter locutiones quae intra linguam fidei (T) feliciter cadunt et eas quae extra eam iacent. Finis felicitas non est defectus, sed confessio quod sermo de Deo manet in gratia eius dependens.

The Holy Spirit determines the boundaries of theological speech, discerning between utterances that fall felicitously within the language of faith T and those that lie beyond it. This boundary of felicity is not a defect but a confession that all speech about God remains dependent upon grace.

Thesis

The Holy Spirit is both the formal and causal condition for theological felicity; it is the divine source by which expressions are included or excluded from the language of faith. The Spirit’s presence sets both the possibility and the limit of theological discourse: it authorizes what can be said rightly, and by that very act, defines what cannot.

Locus classicus

“No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except in the Holy Spirit.” — 1 Corinthians 12:3

Saint Paul reminds us that even the simplest confession of faith is not a human achievement but a divine act. True speech about God depends upon the Spirit who enables it; theology’s grammar is itself pneumatological.

Thesis

The Holy Spirit is the formal and causal condition for theological felicity; it is the divine source by which expressions are included within or excluded from the language of faith. The Spirit’s presence sets both the possibility and the limit of theological discourse: it authorizes what can be said rightly, and by that very act, defines what cannot.

Explicatio

In the previous Disputationes, theology was described first as a language T and then as interpreted through models that connect it to being. But not only does every language require grammar and meaning, it requires authorization as well. Someone must say when speech is fit to be uttered.

In theology, that authorizing agent is not the Church alone, nor is it human reason. It is the Spiritus Sanctus, the Holy Spirit, who determines which expressions belong within T, the Church’s living language of faith.

When we speak of felicity, we mean the condition under which a statement can be rightly spoken in the Spirit. In formal terms, we call these the felicity conditions of T, written FT. These include internal order (logical consistency, coherence, and entailment) and external authorization (the Spirit’s activity discerned through Scripture, confession, and ecclesial life).

The Spirit thus functions as the boundary condition of theology. Like a grammatical rule that both permits and prohibits, the Spirit allows speech that participates in divine life and excludes speech that contradicts it.

To say that theology has a finitude of felicity is to acknowledge that its authorized speech, though real and truthful, nonetheless remains partial. No expression in T exhausts divine truth, for the Spirit never ceases to exceed the words He inspires.

Objectiones

Obiectio I. Karl Barth and other revelation theologians maintain that the act of divine self-disclosure is infinite in origin and scope. To speak of a finite felicity of the Spirit’s operation is to divide the one act of revelation into infinite and finite parts, reducing divine grace to creaturely measure. If the Spirit is truly God, then His activity cannot be characterized as finite without denying His divinity.

Obiectio II. Immanuel Kant would argue that felicity, insofar as it implies union with the divine, cannot be an object of theoretical knowledge. Human reason is bounded by phenomena; divine reality remains noumenal and inaccessible. “Theological felicity” can therefore be at most a moral or regulative idea, guiding action but not describing an ontological state wrought by the Spirit.

Obiectio III. Following Ludwig Wittgenstein, felicity pertains to the successful performance of language within a given form of life. To call a theological utterance “felicitous” means that it fits the grammar of the believing community. Finitude and infinitude are grammatical categories, not metaphysical ones. The Spirit adds nothing beyond the community’s own rule-governed practices of meaning.

Obiectio IV. From a Hegelian standpoint, Spirit (Geist) is infinite self-consciousness realizing itself through the overcoming of finitude. If the Holy Spirit is truly Spirit, then its work in human life must sublate finitude rather than affirm it. To insist on the “finitude of felicity” is to arrest the dialectical movement of Spirit toward the Absolute, leaving theology mired in limitation and incompleteness.

Responsiones

Ad I. The Spirit’s operation is infinite in essence but finite in mode. The same act that is infinite in God becomes finite in the creature through the very generosity of divine condescension. Finitude here does not denote defect but form—the determinate condition under which the infinite communicates itself. The Spirit’s work is not measured by human limits but expressed through them. The finitude of felicity is the medium by which divine reality becomes communicable and effective within history.

Ad II. Kant’s critique of speculative reason rightly identifies the limits of human cognition, yet theology does not seek theoretical knowledge of God but participation in divine communication. Felicity is not a concept but an event: the Spirit’s act of rendering finite speech and understanding proportionate to divine truth. Within this act, finitude becomes the very space of grace. The theological subject remains bounded, but those bounds are filled with divine presence; the finite becomes transparent to the infinite.

Ad III. Wittgenstein correctly locates felicity within the use of language, but he omits its ontological ground. The Church’s grammar is not self-originating; it is constituted and sustained by the Spirit’s act. The felicity of theological language is thus not merely communal correctness but pneumatological authorization. A sentence is felicitous not because the Church says so but because the Spirit speaks through it. Finitude here names not the limit of meaning but the site where divine meaning takes flesh in human words.

Ad IV. Hegel’s dialectic perceives rightly that Spirit and finitude are related, but wrongly that their relation can be expressed as sublation. The Holy Spirit does not abolish finitude but indwells it. The infinite does not return into itself through the finite; it abides with the finite as love. The finitude of felicity thus expresses the perfection proper to creaturely participation—the creature remains itself yet becomes radiant with divine life. Spirit’s infinity is shown not by transcending finitude but by transforming it into communion.

Nota

The distinction between inclusion and exclusion in T may be described symbolically as T_in and T_out.

• T_in designates those expressions that the Spirit renders felicitous, language consistent with Scripture, creed, and the ongoing life of the Church.

• T_out refers to expressions that fail these tests, either through contradiction, incoherence, or lack of spiritual authorization.

This symbolic division simply formalizes what theologians have always practiced in discernment. The Spirit is both the “grammar” and the “breath” of theology: grammar, because He gives order; breath, because He gives life.

To put it differently, the Spirit is the condition of theological intelligibility. Without Him, theology would become a dead syntax,  correct perhaps in structure but devoid of life. With Him, speech about God becomes participation in the very life it names.

Thus, the finitude of felicity marks theology’s humility. It confesses that human language, even when sanctified, cannot contain the infinite. The Spirit authorizes theology’s words and simultaneously guards them from presumption.

Determinatio

From the foregoing it is determined that:

1. The Holy Spirit is the divine ground of theological felicity; He is the One who renders certain expressions speakable within faith.

2. The Spirit’s authorization has both internal criteria (coherence, consistency, right entailment) and external criteria (Scriptural consonance, ecclesial reception, discernible fruits).

3. The boundary of felicity is not a limitation imposed from without but the inner grace by which human speech remains ordered to God.

4. To say that theology is finite in felicity is to acknowledge that its language, though true, is never exhaustive of divine mystery.

5. The Spirit’s dual act of including and excluding establishes theology’s form as a living language: finite in utterance, infinite in source.

Transitus ad Disputationem IV

From the preceding inquiry it is evident that divine truth enters the sphere of human words without themselves ceasing to be divine. Yet if God truly speaks, what is the nature of this truth within language? Does the meaning of theological speech arise from convention, or from participation in the reality it names?

To resolve this, we turn to Disputatio IV: De Veritate Significationis Theologicae, where we shall inquire whether theological predication is merely analogical expression or the very act of the divine Word signifying itself within finite language.

Disputatio II: De Theologia ut Systemate Modelorum

On Theology as a System of Models

Quaeritur

Theologia, ut veritatem habeat, interpretanda est intra systema modelorum, quibus expressiones syntacticae linguae fidei referuntur ad statum rerum a Deo constitutum. Sic veritas theologica est consonantia inter linguam divinitus datam et esse ab eodem Deo productum.

For theology to bear truth, it must be interpreted within a system of models, through which the syntactical expressions of faith’s language are related to states of affairs constituted by God. Theological truth is thus the harmony between divinely given language and divinely created being.

Locus classicus

“By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host.” — Psalm 33:6

In this verse, divine speech and divine creation coincide. The Word that speaks is the same power that brings everything into being. In theological modeling, we rediscover this coincidence: truth arises when language and reality meet in the act of God.

Thesis

Theology, once established as a formally consistent language T, becomes truth-bearing only when its expressions are interpreted within models, within structured descriptions of reality that specify what exists and how what exists relates to God. Accordingly, modeling connects theology’s syntactical order to ontological reference, showing how speech about God corresponds to being as given by God.

Explicatio

If Disputatio I taught that theology must first be syntactically consistent and coherent, Disputatio II teaches that coherence alone does not suffice for truth. A language of faith, no matter how precise, remains incomplete until it is interpreted, until it is “modeled” within an ontological environment. 

In the language of logic, a model is a way of assigning meaning to expressions so that sentences can be true or false. In theology, a model serves a similar role but in a more profound sense: it is a structured account of the world as it stands before God. To say that theology requires modeling is to say that the words of faith must point beyond grammar to existence.

Let T again represent the language of faith: its prayers, confessions, and doctrines. Let M stand for a model, a depiction of the real order of creation, redemption, and consummation. To “interpret T in M” means that theological expressions are linked to the realities specified in M.  For example, the statement “Christ is risen” in T is modeled in M by the ontological claim that the crucified Jesus truly lives, an event and state of affairs that obtains within God’s causally ordered creation.

Theological modeling, then, is not speculation added to faith but the faithful translation of what God has done into the structures of thought and being. It allows the Church’s language to be both confessional and truthful, to say not merely what is believed but what is.

Objectiones

Obiectio I. Immanuel Kant maintains that theoretical knowledge is limited to phenomena structured by the categories of human understanding. Theology, if it is to remain rational, must confine itself to moral postulates and practical reason. To speak of “models” relating faith’s language to divine reality exceeds the bounds of possible knowledge and reintroduces metaphysics.

Obiectio II. Following Martin Heidegger, phenomenology exposes ontology itself as the history of metaphysical forgetfulness. To “model” God within any structure of being risks reducing the divine to a presence among beings, an onto-theological idol. Authentic theology should remain apophatic, letting Being speak rather than constructing models.

Obiectio III. Logical empiricism and early analytic philosophy (e.g., A.J. Ayer, the early Carnap) hold that statements are meaningful only if empirically verifiable or tautological. Theological models cannot be tested or falsified; they are, therefore, pseudo-propositions disguised as metaphors.

Obiectio IV. Cultural-linguistic theology (e.g., George Lindbeck) argues that religious language functions like grammar within a community’s form of life. To “model” theology implies an external reference to a shared reality, contrary to the communal coherence that actually gives theology meaning. Theology should interpret its grammar, not seek models beyond it.

Obiectio V. In Whitehead and Hartshorne’s process thought, God and world form a single dynamic continuum. To construct fixed “models” is to freeze divine becoming into static metaphysical forms. A truly relational theology must renounce models in favor of open-ended process description.

Responsiones

Ad I. Kant rightly insists upon the limits of speculative reason, but theology operates within a different horizon. The limits Kant identifies are epistemic, not ontological. Revelation transcends those limits by grounding knowledge in divine communication rather than human intuition. Modeling theology does not transgress the Critique but extends it analogically: it interprets faith’s language within the structure of being already constituted by the divine Word. The Spirit mediates between language and ontology where pure reason cannot.

Ad II. Heidegger’s concern to avoid onto-theology guards a genuine danger, yet his alternative leaves God silent within the withdrawal of Being. Christian theology confesses not an abstract presence but a personal act—the Word made flesh. Modeling theology does not capture God within being but describes being as participation in God’s speaking. The model functions not as enclosure but as vessel, transparent to the mystery it bears.

Ad III. Empiricist verification collapses under its own criterion: its principle is itself unverifiable. Theological models, by contrast, are verifiable within the domain of faith’s ontology—through coherence with revelation, consistency with confession, and transformative efficacy in the believer. Their truth is pneumatic, not laboratory truth. Theology’s models are judged by whether the Spirit bears witness within them.

Ad IV. Post-liberal theology rightly recovers the communal and grammatical dimensions of faith, yet it risks self-enclosure. Modeling does not impose external realism upon the Church’s grammar but explicates its inherent referential capacity. Scripture and creed speak not merely about communal practice but about divine reality. Theological models make explicit the ontological assumptions that faith already lives by implicitly.

Ad V. Process thought perceives the dynamic relation between God and world but mistakes relationality for mutability. The theological model can express relation without surrendering divine immutability: it portrays creation’s participation in God’s eternal act. Models are not static mechanisms but formal patterns of dependence—diagrams of divine causality.

Nota

To model theology is to seek understanding within faith. It is to recognize that divine revelation, though sovereign and gracious, speaks into a world structured by God’s own rational order. Modeling translates theological language from the level of grammar into the level of ontology, from how we may speak to what there is to be spoken of.

Thus, if T represents the syntactical system of theology and FT its felicity conditions (the rules that make its speech rightly ordered), modeling is the process by which these expressions are joined to TC, their truth conditions. In short:

FT + Modeling = TC. In words: the Spirit’s authorization of language (felicity) combined with its right interpretation within reality (modeling) produces theological truth.

A model is not a cage for divine mystery but the space where divine truth becomes shareable. It lets theology speak with both rigor and reverence, preserving the realism of faith without collapsing it into mere symbol or sentiment.

Determinatio

From the foregoing it is determined that:

1. Theological language T, though divinely authorized, remains incomplete without ontological modeling.

2. Modeling interprets the syntax of faith in light of divine reality, ensuring that theology’s words correspond to what God has made and done.

3. The Holy Spirit is both the author of T and the mediator of its interpretation, guaranteeing that modeling remains participatory, not autonomous.

4. The plurality of models signifies the richness of divine truth as refracted through creation, not its fragmentation.

5. Theology’s formal coherence and ontological adequacy converge in modeling, where speech about God is joined to being before God.

Transitus ad Disputationem III

Having discerned that theology stands above philosophy not by exclusion but by elevation, that is that it perfects reason by participation in divine light, there remains the question of how such light becomes articulate within human discourse. For if wisdom descends from God, it must take form as word, and yet the word, being human, seems too finite to bear the infinite.

Thus we pass to the next disputation, Disputatio III: De Verbo Theologico et Mediatione Linguæ, where it is asked how divine revelation becomes language, and how speech, remaining human, may yet convey the truth of God without dissolution or idolatry.