Disputatio LVI: De Formā Logi ut Principio Intelligibilitatis

 On the Form of the Logos as the Principle of Intelligibility

Quaeritur

Utrum forma Logi sit principium intelligibilitatis omnium divinorum actuum, ita ut omnis divina operatio sit cognoscibilis solum quia informatur a Logō; et quomodo haec informatio non solvat simplicitatem divinam neque introducat abstractionem supra vitam Trinitatis.

Whether the form of the Logos constitutes the principle of intelligibility for all divine acts, such that every divine operation is knowable only because it has its determinate form in the Logos; and how this does not compromise divine simplicity nor introduce an abstraction standing above the life of the Trinity.

Thesis

The Logos is not merely the interpreter of divine action nor a medium through which intelligibility flows. The Logos is the ground of intelligibility itself. Every divine act is intelligible because its act-form subsists in the Logos. There is no higher principle of order, no abstract structure, no metaphysical category that conditions God’s intelligibility from without.

The form of the Logos is therefore both metaphysically constitutive and epistemically foundational: constitutive because all divine action is structurally what it is in and as the Logos; foundational because creatures know divine action only by participation in this Logos-formed intelligibility.

Thus intelligibility is neither imposed upon God nor constructed by creatures. It is the radiance of the divine act as it subsists in the eternal Word.

Locus Classicus

John 1:18
ὁ μονογενὴς Θεὸς… ἐκεῖνος ἐξηγήσατο.
“The only-begotten God… He has made Him known.”

The Logos is the exegesis of God, not by reporting but by being the intelligible form of divine life.

Colossians 1:16–17
τὰ πάντα δι’ αὐτοῦ καὶ εἰς αὐτὸν ἔκτισται… καὶ τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκε.
“All things were created through Him and for Him… and in Him all things hold together.”

Creation’s intelligibility depends on the Logos’ inner structural sufficiency.

Athanasius, Contra Arianos II.22
ὁ Λόγος μορφὴ τοῦ Πατρός ἐστιν.
“The Word is the form of the Father.”

Luther, WA 40 III, 64
Christus est ratio et forma omnium promissionum.
“Christ is the reason and form of all promises.”

Divine intelligibility is Christologically concentrated.

Explicatio

1. Intelligibility cannot arise from creaturely or abstract conditions

Theological modernity has sometimes treated intelligibility as a category external to God—a structure into which God must “fit” to be known. This misconstrues both metaphysics and revelation. Intelligibility is not a transcendental horizon that precedes God; neither is it a human conceptual framework imposed upon divine action.

To posit intelligibility as an abstract form above God would be to posit a metaphysical genus under which God falls. This violates the categorical dualism of Creator and creature and implicitly denies divine simplicity.

Therefore: whatever intelligibility divine acts possess must arise from within the divine life itself.

2. The Logos as the constitutive form of divine intelligibility

Following Disputatio LV, where divine intention and divine act were shown to be one in the Logos, we now articulate the deeper structure: Every divine act is intelligible because its form subsists in the Logos as its constitutive intelligibility.

This means:

• The Logos is not the representation of divine operations.

• The Logos is their formal principle, their internal determination.

• The Logos is not a cognitive filter applied by creatures but the intrinsic ground by which divine actions can be known at all.

Intelligibility is therefore ontological before it is epistemological. In classical terms: the forma logica of divine action is simply the Logos Himself, the eternal articulation of the Father’s being.

3. Intelligibility and divine simplicity

This view preserves simplicity rather than threatens it. For if God were intelligible by a form other than the Logos, God would be composite: essence + form, act + structure. But Scripture and tradition affirm that the Word is eternally “with God” and “is God.” Therefore the form that makes God’s act intelligible is not added to God but is God.

The Logos is the divine act in its intelligible articulation. This articulation is one with the being of God, not an abstraction above it.

4. Creaturely knowledge as participation in Logos-formed intelligibility

Creaturely knowledge of God, then, is not a climb toward divine essence nor a projection of human concepts onto divinity. It is the Spirit-enabled participation in the intelligibility that already inheres in the Logos.

The Spirit does not produce intelligibility; the Spirit grants access to intelligibility already constituted in the Logos. Thus every act of divine revelation—Scripture, sacrament, promise—is not merely information but participation in the Logos’ intelligible form.

What creatures perceive as “revelation” is nothing other than the Logos donating His own act-form to them.

5. Rejection of merely linguistic or postliberal construals

Some modern theologies, especially postliberal ones, treat intelligibility as a function of the ecclesial grammar that governs Christian discourse. But grammar without metaphysical anchor cannot disclose divine act. It only regulates human speech.

The intelligibility of theology must be anchored in the Logos or it becomes circular, self-referential, and finally empty. Revelation is not the community’s speech about God; it is God’s act made knowable because the Logos is its form.

Objectiones

Ob I. If intelligibility is located in the Logos, we introduce a second-level structure in God, undermining simplicity.

Ob II. If all intelligibility is in the Logos, the Father and Spirit become unintelligible except through the Son—an implicit subordinationism.

Ob III. Intelligibility is a creaturely category; to attribute it to God is anthropomorphism.

Ob IV. Intelligibility in the Logos suggests determination of divine acts, jeopardizing divine freedom.

Ob V. Postliberal theology denies that intelligibility is metaphysical; it is purely linguistic.

Responsiones

Ad I. No second-level structure is introduced. The Logos is God; therefore no composition arises. Intelligibility is not an attribute added to God but the radiance of divine act.

Ad II. The knowledge of God is indeed through the Son, but this is not subordination. It is Johannine metaphysics. The Son is the exegesis of the Father, and the Spirit grants participation. Each person is known personally in the one divine act.

Ad III. Creaturely intelligibility is a participation in divine intelligibility, not its source. Anthropomorphism arises only when creatures impose structures on God; we instead receive intelligibility from God.

Ad IV. Determination in the Logos is not constraint. It is the fullness of divine act in its eternal articulation. Freedom is the plentitude of act, not the absence of form.

Ad V. Grammar without ontology cannot speak of God. The Logos grounds all theological grammar by grounding the very acts theology names.

Nota

To say that the Logos is the principle of intelligibility is to say that divine truth is not a construction, approximation, or regulative ideal. It is the self-articulation of God’s own life. Theology’s intelligibility, then, is not a human achievement but a gift: the Spirit draws creatures into the Logos’ articulation of divine being.

This is why theology cannot begin with epistemology. It must begin with Christology. Knowledge of God is grounded not in the capacities of the knower but in the intelligible form of the One who acts and gives Himself to be known.

Determinatio

We therefore determine:

1. Intelligibility is not an external condition to which God conforms but an internal articulation of God’s act in the Logos.

2. The Logos is the constitutive form of all divine action; nothing God does is without this form.

3. Creaturely knowledge of God is participation in the Logos by the Spirit’s donation.

4. This view preserves divine simplicity, avoids abstraction, and grounds theological realism.

5. No theological statement (Tₜ) can be true unless grounded in the Logos-constituted act that Λ ⊨* Tₜ specifies.

Transitus ad Disputationem LVII

Having established that the Logos is the condition of intelligibility for all divine action, we now consider how this intelligibility becomes efficacious in creaturely life. If intelligibility is constituted in the Logos, it is communicated through the Spirit’s act of illumination.

Thus we proceed to Disputatio LVII: De Spiritu Ut Luminatore Intelligibilitatis, where we examine how the Spirit grants creatures access to the intelligible structure of divine act without reducing revelation to cognition or collapsing knowledge into mere conceptuality.

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Quaestiones Analyticae Post Determinationem

Q1. You say that the Logos is the constitutive form of all divine action. Yet the term ‘form’ can be elusive. What exactly is meant here?

Responsio

The term form is not employed in its Aristotelian sense as an intrinsic constituent of a composed substance, nor in the Kantian sense of a subjective structuring condition. Rather, by form I mean the intelligible principle that makes an act the act it is. Every act must possess an internal principle of specification if it is to be identified as a distinct act. Divine action requires the same.

The Logos is the subsisting intelligibility of God. It is through the Son that divine agency is articulate rather than opaque, intelligible rather than merely asserted. To call the Logos the constitutive form of divine action is to say that divine acts have their identity through the one who makes God’s intentionality expressible. Without this, the category of divine action loses its internal criterion. It becomes a projection rather than an intelligible feature of God’s life.

Q2. Should this be understood as a grounding claim, a truthmaker claim, or something else?

Responsio.

It is best understood as a hyperintensional individuation thesis. Grounding and truthmaking presuppose that the relata already possess stable identity. My concern here precedes both. Before one can ask what grounds a divine act or what makes a proposition about divine action true, one must know what makes a divine act identifiable.

The Logos supplies this. It is the principle that secures the fine grained identity conditions of divine action. Once divine acts are intelligibly individuated, questions of grounding or truthmaking can arise. But the individuation of divine agency is logically prior, and that is what the claim addresses.

Q3. Does positing an eternal form for divine action entail modal collapse or eternalism?

Responsio.

No. An identity condition does not entail necessity. The fact that the Logos eternally provides the intelligible form of divine action does not imply that God must actualize any particular action. It means only that whenever God does act, the identity of that act will be articulated through the Son.

Thus the world’s history remains contingent and freely willed. Its intelligibility is eternal, because God is eternal, but its actuality belongs entirely to divine freedom. No eternalist picture is required. There is an eternal form of divine agency because God is eternally intelligible. But the exercise of divine agency takes place freely within the temporal economy.

Q4. Does this risk collapsing divine action into divine conceptualism, reducing divine acts to internal mental events?

Responsio.

No. Conceptualism arises only if one regards the Logos as a divine idea. But the Logos is not a concept. The Logos is a person. As the personal intelligibility of God, the Son is the one through whom God acts in creation. Thus the form of divine action is not conceptual but personal and causal.

Divine action is individuated in God but enacted in the world. The intelligibility that specifies divine action and the causality that accomplishes divine action coincide in the Logos. This unity prevents conceptualism. Divine actions are not mental episodes within God but the personal acts of God who reveals himself through the very structure that makes his acts knowable.

Nota Finalis

In this disputation we have asked how divine action can be intelligible without reducing God to a creaturely agent or dissolving divine agency into mere effects. The analytic questions press precisely on the point where intelligibility and transcendence meet. They reveal that the specification of divine action must lie within God and yet cannot remain a purely inward matter. The Logos answers this requirement. The Son is the one in whom divine agency is articulate for us and the one through whom divine agency is enacted toward us. These questions therefore serve not to complicate the Determinatio but to show its inner coherence: divine action is intelligible because God is intelligible, and God is intelligible because the Logos is God’s own self articulation.

Disputatio LV: De Intentione Divina et Identitate Actuum in Deo

On Divine Intention and the Identity of God’s Acts

Quaeritur

Utrum intentiones divinae sint ipsi actus divini secundum rationem essendi, an potius principia actuum; et quomodo unitas intentionis et actus in ipso Logō constituatur sine confusione personarum vel collapsu distinctionum operum.

Whether divine intentions are themselves divine acts in their ground of being, or whether they should be understood as principles preceding divine acts; and how the unity of intention and act is constituted in the Logos without confusing the persons or collapsing the distinctions among divine operations.

Thesis

Divine intention is not a condition that precedes action, nor a preparatory state within God. Intention in God is itself a divine act. To distinguish the two, even conceptually, would introduce sequence or internal differentiation into the divine life and thereby undermine divine simplicity.

Divine intention and divine act are therefore identical in being but distinguished in their formal orientation: one names God’s act as it is understood in relation to God’s inner life, the other names that same act as it is directed toward creatures. This unity is constituted in the Logos, in whom all divine action is intelligible, and it is donated to creatures by the Spirit, who grants participation in the concrete act that God is performing.

Thus, the identity of intention and act is neither a collapse into unipersonalism nor a fragmentation of God’s work. It is the form of divine agency itself.

Locus Classicus

1. Isaiah 55:11
   לֹא־יָשׁוּב אֵלַי רֵיקָם
   “My word shall not return to me empty.”

Here intention (my word) and act (it accomplishes) are indivisible. The divine Word is the performing.

2. John 1:3
   καὶ χωρὶς αὐτοῦ ἐγένετο οὐδὲ ἕν
   “Without Him nothing came to be.”

The Logos is not merely the instrument of intention but its operative identity.

3. Maximus Confessor, Ambigua 7
   ἡ θεία πρόθεσις ἔργον ἐστίν.
   “The divine intention is an act.”

Maximus explicitly identifies intention and act, distinguishing them only by their tropos of manifestation.

4. Luther, WA 40 I, 360
   Deus operatur, dum loquitur.
   “God acts in speaking.”

In God, intention (speaking) and operation (acting) are metaphysically identical.

Explicatio

1. Why created intention does not illuminate divine intention

In creaturely agency, intention precedes action. A human being entertains possibilities, evaluates alternatives, forms a plan, and then carries it out. Intention and action are therefore distinguishable stages within a temporal process, and each stage has psychological and deliberative elements appropriate to finite agents.

None of this applies to God. To speak of a divine “intention” that is not already identical with divine action introduces a conceptual gap into God’s life. Such a gap implies sequence, potentiality, or unrealized form—all of which are incompatible with divine simplicity. Any model that treats intention as a prior state that makes action possible inadvertently imposes creaturely categories on God. It mistakes the internal life of the Trinity for a process analogous to human deliberation. This obscures the nature of divine action rather than clarifying it.

Thus, in theology we must reject accounts of intention that retain even a faint shadow of psychological or modal priority. They cannot describe a God who is pure act.

2. Intention as formal act in the Logos

If intention cannot stand before action, the alternative is not to remove the concept but to understand it correctly. Divine intention is the act-form of God’s own acting. When we speak of God’s intending, we speak of the internal form of an act as it exists in the Logos.

Because the Logos is the constitutive ground of divine intelligibility, every divine act has its determinate form in the Logos. That form is not something separate from the act itself; it is the act in its intelligible structure. Thus “intention” names the act as it exists in the Logos, and “action” names that same form as it is directed toward creatures. These are two relational orientations of the same divine reality, not two stages or components.

This distinction is not an embellishment but a necessity: it allows us to explain how divine acts are both one in God and manifold toward creatures without collapsing either level into the other.

3. How the Spirit donates the unity of intention and act

The Spirit’s work makes this unity available to creatures. The Spirit does not donate a general divine favor or a generic presence. Rather, the Spirit donates the specific act that God is performing—God’s forgiving, consoling, sanctifying, or indwelling here and now.

Because the Spirit’s donation is always of a concrete and particular act, the divine intention behind that act must itself be concretely and particularly formed. The Spirit cannot give what is not already determinate in God. This specificity presupposes a hyperintensional divine life in which acts are distinguishable by their internal form, even when their effects coincide.

Thus, divine intention and divine act remain united in God but are given to creatures according to the Spirit’s donation of the act-form appropriate to them in that moment.

4. The Trinity and the identity of intentions

It may seem that identifying intention with act risks eliminating Trinitarian distinctions. But the opposite is the case: it protects them. If we treat intention as a pre-act located in the Father, action as the execution of the Son, and application as the work of the Spirit, we create a sequence of roles that mirrors creaturely agency. Classical theology rejects this.

What we must say is this: the same divine act-form exists in the one God, but it is known and given according to the personal modes of Father, Son, and Spirit. The Father’s willing is the Son’s acting is the Spirit’s donating—one act, fully divine, yet personally differentiated.

Thus, the unity of intention and act is theologically indispensable. Without it, the divine life becomes a chain of tasks distributed among persons; with it, we preserve both unity of being and distinction of persons.

Objectiones

Ob I. If intention and act are identical, then distinctions of divine willing become unintelligible.
Ob II. If intention is act, the Trinity collapses into a single operational subject.
Ob III. Classical Thomism teaches that God’s will is simple; therefore all intentions are one, and their individuation is a creaturely projection.
Ob IV. If intention is hyperintensional, this is merely linguistic, not metaphysical.
Ob V. Postliberal theology denies that divine intention bears metaphysical significance beyond ecclesial grammar.

Responsiones

Ad I. Distinctions remain at the level of the rationes formales of act—hyperintensional forms in the Logos—not at the level of temporal sequencing.

Ad II. The act-form is one, but the personal modes of intending/acting/donating remain irreducibly distinct. Unity does not imply unipersonality.

Ad III. Simplicity entails non-composition, not indistinction. The Fathers (Athanasius, Basil, Gregory) maintained simplicity while affirming real distinctions of operation.

Ad IV. Hyperintensionality is a metaphysical precision: it describes the identity of divine action, not the finesse of creaturely language.

Ad V. Grammar without metaphysical anchor collapses into self-reference. Divine intention grounds the community’s speech, not vice versa.

Nota

The theological implications follow directly. A God whose intentions are not identical with His acts would be a God who deliberates, evaluates, and chooses between unrealized options. This would make God’s inner life resemble that of creatures rather than the self-sufficient life of Father, Son, and Spirit.

By identifying intention and act, we preserve the immediacy of divine agency and the personal character of God’s deeds toward creatures. It is also what allows the Spirit to donate not abstractions but living realities: forgiveness, consolation, new life, and the presence of Christ.

The unity of intention and act is therefore not a speculative refinement. It is the metaphysical condition for understanding God as the one who acts personally and decisively for us.

Determinatio

We therefore determine:

1. Divine intention is not a precursor to action but the act itself in its intelligible form.

2. This act-form is constituted in the Logos, who is the principle of divine intelligibility.

3. The Spirit donates this act-form concretely, making it present to creatures.

4. The unity of intention and act preserves divine simplicity while allowing real distinctions of divine operation.

5. Theological truth depends on this unity, for Λ ⊨* Tₜ presupposes a determinate divine act that grounds a determinate theological statement.

Transitus ad Disputationem LVI

Having established that divine intention is itself a divine act and that its unity with action is constituted in the Logos and donated by the Spirit, we now turn to the deeper question of intelligibility itself. If every divine act is intelligible because it has its form in the Logos, then the Logos is not merely the site of intelligibility but its very condition.

Thus we proceed to Disputatio LVI: De Formā Logi Ut Principio Intelligibilitatis, where we consider how the Logos grounds the possibility of knowing anything of God’s action at all.

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Quaestiones Analyticae Post Determinationem

Q1. You often speak of a difference in ratio while the essendi remains constant. But this immediately reminds many readers of the Scotist distinctio formalis, which has a long and uneven history, and which many analytic philosophers regard as incoherent. Some even collapse it into a mere distinction of ratio and essendi. What do you say to those of us who find the formal distinction itself problematic?

Responsio.

The concern is understandable, because whenever one distinguishes ratio from essendi there is a temptation to hear Scotus in the background, as if I were claiming that one and the same entity contains quasi-formal “aspects” that are neither purely conceptual nor fully real. That is not what I am doing. My position requires something far more modest, something that belongs firmly within the broader scholastic tradition and that does not depend on the apparatus of Scotist formalities.

The distinctio formalis of Scotus is a bold metaphysical thesis. It asserts a mode of distinction that is intrinsic to the thing itself yet short of a real distinction. This “middle category” has always been difficult to defend. Many philosophers suspect that it introduces an ontological complexity that cannot be stably articulated.

My usage does not require this. What I need is simply the claim that one and the same entity can be intelligible under more than one valid conceptual ratio without thereby being divided in its being. This is the classical distinctio rationis cum fundamento in re. It allows the intellect to approach the same reality in different conceptual postures without implying multiple formal components in the object.

Thus when I distinguish two rationes in relation to a single essendi, I am not claiming that God or creature possesses internal formal partitions. I am claiming that the intellect legitimately encounters the same reality under different questions of understanding. These distinct conceptual angles track genuine features of the real, yet they do not require positing any intrinsic multiplicity in the thing considered.

The distinction is therefore epistemic in function, though not arbitrary. It is grounded in the richness of the object’s intelligibility, not in any internal composition. One can investigate divine transcendence and divine immanence as distinct rationes without thereby asserting two formalities within God. The distinction belongs to the mode of our apprehension, not to the internal structure of the divine being.

In brief: I do not employ the Scotist distinctio formalis. I employ the more modest and broadly accepted distinction of ratio with a single essendi, understood as a conceptual distinction that has grounding in reality but does not posit ontological division. This is sufficient to sustain the metaphysical and theological work of the disputation without incurring the liabilities of Scotist formalism.

Q2. If the distinction you use is only a distinctio rationis cum fundamento in re, how does this avoid collapsing into a purely conceptual distinction? In other words, what secures the ‘fundamentum in re’ so that the distinction of ratio tracks something real and is not merely a projection of the intellect?

Responsio.

The question is important because the distinction of ratio can become fragile if it lacks a real anchor. A purely conceptual distinction would indeed be insufficient for theological work, since it would reduce our differentiations to categories imposed by the mind rather than disclosures of something in the object.

The key point is that a distinctio rationis cum fundamento in re requires two elements.  First, the intellect must adopt different conceptual postures toward the same being. Second, the being must be such that these conceptual postures correspond to real modes of intelligibility latent in the object itself.

This means that the distinction has an epistemic form but an ontological grounding. We do not posit internal parts or formal components within the entity. We say instead that the entity lends itself to more than one valid conceptual entry point. The richness is in the object, not in our mental constructions. The different rationes arise because the reality under consideration is capable of being understood under diverse questions.

A simple example from classical theology illustrates the point. When we consider God under the ratio of simplicity, the intellect is attending to God’s unity. When we consider God under the ratio of goodness, the intellect is attending to God’s communicative plenitude. These are distinct conceptual approaches, but they correspond to actual features of the divine being. They do not fracture the divine essence; they articulate the multiple lines along which that essence is intelligible.

Thus, the distinction of ratio is neither arbitrary nor merely verbal. It is constrained by what the object is. The fundamentum in re is the object’s intelligible plenitude. The intellect does not impose distinctions. It recognizes those aspects of intelligibility that belong naturally to the object.

In this way, the distinction functions as a disciplined conceptual tool anchored in being, not a free floating mental projection.

Nota Finalis

The two analytic questions taken together protect the metaphysical grammar of this disputation from misunderstanding. They show that the distinction I employ neither falls into Scotist formalism nor collapses into mere conceptualism. It is a distinction of ratio grounded in the object, allowing one being to be the subject of multiple lines of intelligible approach without implying internal composition. This is the structure upon which the later disputationes rely when treating divine action, participation, and the intelligibility of God’s self revelation.

Disputatio LIV: De Hyperintensionalitate Divinae Operationis:

 

On the Hyperintensionality of Divine Action

Quaeritur

Utrum actus divini, quoad identitatem, formam, et rationem essendi, non possint explicari per extensionalem aequivalentiam, modalem necessitationem, vel possibilia mundorum, sed sint essentialiter hyperintensionales; et utrum veritas theologica requirat talem hyperintensionalitatem ut Deus cognoscatur secundum actum, non secundum eventum.

Whether the identity and form of divine acts can be explained by extensional equivalence, modal necessity, or possible-world semantics, or whether they are essentially hyperintensional; and whether theological truth requires such hyperintensionality so that God is known according to the act God performs, not merely according to an outcome.

Thesis

Divine acts are hyperintensional. By this we mean that the identity of a divine act cannot be captured by any framework in which acts are considered the same whenever they yield the same outcomes, share the same extension, or hold necessarily across all possible worlds. A divine act is not defined by its effects, nor by the set of circumstances under which it occurs, nor by its modal profile. Instead, a divine act is individuated by its formal identity within the Logos, by the specific constitutive act through which the Logos brings a res into being or presence, and by the Spirit’s concrete donation of that act to creatures.

Thus, extension does not capture divine identity,modal equivalence does not capture divine identity, and possible-world semantics is too coarse-grained to describe divine agency. A hyperintensional account alone preserves the theological conviction that God’s acts are personal, irreducible, and internally differentiated modes of the one divine life.

Locus Classicus

1. Exodus 3:14 — אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה

“I AM WHO I AM.”

This is not a definition, but an identity of act. Being itself is hyperintensional, for it names a unique form of divine acting, not a property instantiated across possible worlds.

2. John 5:19 — ἃ ἂν ἐκεῖνος ποιῇ, ταῦτα καὶ ὁ Υἱὸς ὁμοίως ποιεῖ

“Whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise.”

The divine act is not duplicated or numerically separable. Rather, its identity is internal to the Trinity, not extensionalized in effects.

3. Athanasius, Contra Arianos I.21

ὁμοούσιος οὐ κατὰ θέλησιν ἀλλὰ κατὰ φύσιν.
“Of one being not by will but by nature.”

The divine act is identical with divine being; it is an identity finer than any modal equivalence.

4. Gregory of Nyssa, Ad Ablabium

Οὐ τὰ γινόμενα, ἀλλ᾽ ὁ τρόπος τῆς ἐνεργείας τὴν διαφοράν ποιεῖ.
“It is not the outcomes, but the manner of operation that makes the distinction.”

This is a classical statement of hyperintensionality clearly stating that the manner by which something obtains profoundly matters.

5. Luther, WA 40/III, 343

Deus non est causa sicut causae creatae.
“God is not a cause as created causes are causes.”

Thus God cannot be modeled extensionally.

Explicatio

1. Why extensional identity is inadequate

Extensional identity holds when two expressions apply to precisely the same set of objects. If two predicates pick out exactly the same individuals, classical extensional logic treats them as equivalent. For example, if every creature that is forgiven is also elected, and every creature that is elected is also justified, then these predicates are extensionally equivalent: they have the same extension.

Formally, if for all x, x is forgiven ↔ x is elected and x is elected ↔ x is justified, then the predicates forgiven, elected, and justified are coextensive.

Similarly, in the Spirit’s work, if for all x, x speaks in the Spirit ↔ x has been given the Spirit, and x has been given the Spirit ↔ the Spirit dwells in x, then Spirit-speaking, Spirit-giving, and Spirit-indwelling are extensionally equivalent expressions.

But extensional equivalence tells us nothing about what distinguishes these divine actions in God Himself. Forgiving is not the same divine act as electing, nor is electing the same divine act as justifying. Likewise, the Spirit’s giving, indwelling, and speaking are not identical divine operations simply because they coincide in the believer. Extensional identity collapses formally distinct divine works into a single undifferentiated outcome and therefore cannot serve as the framework for a theology that seeks to speak truthfully of God’s own acting because it identifies divine acts only under the aspect of creaturely reception.

2. Why modal equivalence is insufficient

A second temptation is to appeal to modal identity. Accordingly, if two acts occur in every possible world in which God acts toward creatures, or if one cannot conceive God performing one without the other, then they are treated as identical.

Creation and preservation offer a clear example. Classical theology holds that God’s preserving of the creature is nothing other than the continued giving of being. Because no creature could exist for a moment apart from God’s sustaining act, creation and preservation are necessarily coextensive: wherever one occurs, the other is already taking place.

So too with incarnation and redemption. In the Christian confession, the Son becomes incarnate for our salvation, and His incarnate life is unintelligible apart from His redeeming work. One cannot separate them modally, for in every possible description of God’s salvific activity, incarnation and redemption occur together.

Yet modal inseparability does not entail formal identity. Creation and preservation differ in their reason, because one brings being into existence, while the other maintains that being in existence. Incarnation and redemption differ likewise, for one is the assumption of human nature, the other is the reconciling act performed in that nature. Modal equivalence cannot register these distinctions because it treats any necessarily co-occurring acts as identical, thereby losing the finer structure of God’s activity that theology must retain.

3. Why divine acts require hyperintensional individuation

If theology is to speak truthfully, it must be able to say why this particular divine act grounds this theological statement. In our broader account, a theological utterance is true because the Logos performs a determinate act—Λ ⊨* Tₜ. But determinate truth requires determinate action. If divine acts could not be distinguished except by their extensions or modal profiles, then the truthmaker for any theological statement would be some undifferentiated divine activity, and doctrinal distinctions would lose their ontological grounding.

By hyperintensional identity I mean that divine acts differ not by their outcomes or by their modal placement but by their internal form in the Logos—the determinate way God is acting here and not otherwise. This internal form cannot be captured by appeal to effects, extensions, or modal profiles; it belongs to the act as God performs it. Forgiving is formally distinct from electing because each expresses a different aspect of the divine life, even when the same creature receives both. The Spirit’s indwelling is formally distinct from the Spirit’s giving because each arises from a different manner of divine self-communication. Hyperintensionality preserves the integrity of these differences.

4. The Spirit’s donation is hyperintensional

The Spirit does not donate to creatures a general divine presence or a generic divine favor. Instead, the Spirit donates the specific act that God is performing toward the believer. In one moment, this may be forgiveness; in another, consolation; in another, empowerment. The specificity of the Spirit’s donation presupposes a finely articulated structure of divine action in God Himself. Without this specificity, divine presence would become conceptual rather than real, and theology would lose the concreteness of God’s address.

5. Felicity is indexed to particular divine acts

A theological assertion is felicitous only if it corresponds to the act God is performing here and now because that act is already determinate in God prior to its authorization in speech, already individuated in God with a hyperintensional precision. The Spirit authorizes not theological grammar in general but this particular word because this particular divine act is being given. Thus the intelligibility of theology depends on a hyperintensional account of divine acting.

Objectiones

Ob I: According to classical extensionalism if two divine acts produce the same effects, they are the same act. If this is so, there is o need for hyperintensional identity.

Ob II: Modal realism holds that if God necessarily performs A and B, then He performs A and B in all possible worlds, and thus A = B. Therefore, modal equivalence suffices in individuation.

Ob III: Thomism claims that since God is simple, all divine actions are identical and distinctions collapse.

Ob IV: Deflationism asserts that hyperintensionality describes linguistic distinction, not metaphysical difference.

Ob V: Postliberalism holds that since all distinctions arise from use within the community, divine action adds nothing.

Responsiones

Ad I: Effects underdetermine cause. Divine acts differ in their formal ratio, not merely in outcome (Gregory of Nyssa). Thus, extension collapses personal identity.

Ad II: Possible-world semantics assumes shared structure with creaturely action. But divine acts exist outside modal ontology; they ground modality rather than inhabit it. God is not a node in a modal structure but its creator.

Ad III: While implicity entails no composition in God, it does not follow that divine acts lack distinct formal identities. The Fathers held simplicity alongside real distinctions of operation.

Ad IV: Hyperintensionality is not linguistic fineness but metaphysical precision. Divine act identity is not a function of language but of participation in the Logos.

Ad V: While usage explains how we talk, it does not identify what God does. Without hyperintensional divine action, grammar loses its anchor in reality.

Nota

Hyperintensionality is the ontological form of God’s personal action. We have seen that constitutive causation (L) requires fine-grained identity; that real presence (LI) is specific, not generic; that donation (LII) concerns a particular res, and that felicity (LIII) authorizes a particular act of creaturely speech. If theological semantics were simply extensional or modal, the Trinity collapses into one role, the sacrament collapses into symbol, revelation collapses into a proposition, grace collapses into an effect, and Christology collapses into monism.

Regarding the Trinity, hyperintensionality preserves the distinction of the trinitarian persons, Christ’s unique acts, sacramental specificity, and the performative depth of divine truth. Simply put, hyperintensionality is not an analytic embellishment but a theological necessity. Without it, we could not preserve the conviction that God acts personally and decisively for the creature, nor could we maintain the integrity of the Gospel’s claim that God’s work is addressed to us in its fullness and specificity.

Determinatio

We have determined that:

1. Divine acts are intrinsically hyperintensional, distinct in their internal form even when extensionally identical.

2. Neither extensional equivalence nor modal necessity suffices to individuate divine action.

3. Hyperintensional identity flows from the Logos’ constitutive act (L) and is made present (LI), donated (LII), and authorized (LIII).

4. Theological truth (Λ ⊨* Tₜ) requires such hyperintensional grounding.

5. Therefore, theology must employ a hyperintensional semantics to speak truly of God.

Transitus ad Disputationem LV: De Intentione Divina et Identitate Actuum in Deo

Having established hyperintensionality in divine action, we proceed to the related question as to how divine intentions are related to divine acts, and how the Logos unifies them without collapsing distinctions. 

Thus, we turn to Disputatio LV: De Intentione Divina: Utrum Intentiones Dei Sint Actus et Quomodo Unitas in Logō Constituitur, where we shall inquire as to whether God’s intentions are identical with His acts, and how the Logos grounds their unity and distinction.

Disputatio LIII: De Felicitate Theologica: Utrum Spiritus Sit Auctor Locutionis Fideli

 On Theological Felicity: Whether the Spirit is the Author of Faithful Speech

Quaeritur

Utrum felicitas locutionis theologicae, id est, rectitudo, auctoritas, et veritas performativa sermonis fidei, non ex intentione vel peritia humana oriatur, sed ex ipso Spiritu Sancto qui loquentem informat, linguam fidei custodiens, purgans, et in Verbo ordinans.

Whether the felicity of theological speech—its rightness, authority, and performative truth—arises not from human intention or rhetorical skill but from the Holy Spirit, who forms the speaker, guards the language of faith, and orders it to the Word.

Thesis

Theological felicity is Spirit-authored rightness of speech. A theological utterance is felicitous not merely when it is grammatically correct or doctrinally sound, but when the Spirit authorizes the speech-act so that the real presence of the Logos (Disp. LI) and the constitutive truth (Disp. L) are authorized for creaturely utterance in one act of fidelis locutio.”

Thus: Felicity just in case forma recta + auctoritas Spiritus + ordinatio ad Verbum. The creature speaks truthfully because the Spirit speaks in, with, and through the creature.

Locus Classicus

1. 1 Corinthians 12:3 — οὐδεὶς δύναται εἰπεῖν· Κύριος Ἰησοῦς, εἰ μὴ ἐν Πνεύματι Ἁγίῳ

“No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except in the Holy Spirit.”

Since the simplest and most central Christian confession is impossible without the Spirit, felicity is pneumatic.

2. Romans 8:26 — τὸ Πνεῦμα συναντιλαμβάνεται τῇ ἀσθενείᾳ ἡμῶν

“The Spirit helps us in our weakness… He intercedes with groanings too deep for words.”

The Spirit perfects our speech when our words fail.

3. John 14:26 — ἐκεῖνος διδάξει ὑμᾶς πάντα

“The Spirit will teach you all things and remind you of all that I have said.”

Speech becomes felicitous when it is brought under the teaching and remembrance of the Spirit.

4. Augustine, De Trinitate XV.19

Spiritus est nexus amoris quo redimus ad Verbum.
“The Spirit is the bond of love through whom we return to the Word.”

The Spirit links the human speaker to the Word He speaks.

5. Luther, WA 10/3, 14

Spiritus Sanctus est verus doctor verbi.
“The Holy Spirit is the true teacher of the Word.”

Preaching is felicitous only as the Spirit’s work.

Explicatio

Disputatio LII established that reference in theology is donation, that the Spirit gives the res. Yet the possession of a donated res does not by itself yield a felicitous assertion. Between the ontological gift of the thing and the faithful utterance of the Word, another act is required. This act is not interpretive mediation but authorization.

1. Felicity as Pneumatic Authorization

In theological speech, felicity is not reducible to correctness of syntax, accuracy of doctrinal formulation, sincerity of intention, rhetorical force, or conceptual clarity. All of these may be present without faithful speech occurring. Felicity consists rather in the Holy Spirit’s act of authorizing a finite utterance to function as faithful speech within the order of the Word.

This authorization does not interpret the Word, translate the Word, or supply meaning to the Word. It grants the speaker the right to speak under the Word, so that the utterance stands as obedient proclamation rather than autonomous discourse.

2. The Structure of Felicity

A theological utterance is felicitous if and only if two conditions are jointly satisfied.

First, the utterance must satisfy the internal conditions of theological grammar: it must be well formed, consistent, coherent, and suitably derivable within the rule governed language of faith.

Second, the utterance must be externally authorized by the Holy Spirit, who orders it to the Word and grants it the status of faithful speech.

This is why Paul says:

“We speak not in words taught by human wisdom, but taught by the Spirit” (1 Cor 2:13).

The contrast is not between interpretation and its absence, but between speech generated by human authority and speech authorized by the Spirit.

3. Felicity and the Operator Λ ⊨* Tₜ

Truth through the Logos (Λ ⊨* Tₜ) concerns the constitutive grounding of theological truth in the divine act. Felicity does not add content to this truth, nor does it mediate its meaning. Rather, felicity concerns whether a particular utterance may bear that truth as faithful speech.

Felicity is thus the Spirit’s authorization of a grammatically proper utterance to function as a vehicle of truth, not by interpretive enrichment, but by pneumatic commissioning.

A felicitous theological assertion occurs when a Spirit authorized utterance is permitted to stand within the Church as obedient speech under the Logos.

4. Felicity as Participation

To speak felicitously is to participate in the Logos’ constitutive act (L), the Logos’ real presence (LI), and the Spirit’s authorizing work (LIII). Human speech does not become divine speech by interpretation, but is taken up into divine speech by authorization.

Accordingly, theological language remains fully creaturely in form while becoming faithful in act. Felicity is the mode by which creaturely speech is grafted into divine discourse without ceasing to be creaturely.

Objectiones

Ob I: According to the speech act theory of Austin and Searle, felicity conditions are constituted by socially established conventions governing successful performance. If a speech act satisfies the relevant conventional conditions, it is felicitous. Therefore theological felicity requires no pneumatic authorization beyond conformity to established pragmatic rules.

Ob II: Classical Protestant orthodoxy assumes that speech is felicitous when it conforms to orthodox doctrine. If this is so, divine authorization appears unnecessary.

Ob III: Liberal Protestantism claims that truthful speech arises from the authenticity of the speaker’s self-expression. If so, felicity does not require external divine agency.

Ob IV: Contemporary linguistic philosophy maintains that felicity consists in correct rule following within a linguistic practice. If a theological utterance conforms to the grammar, norms, and inferential roles of ecclesial language, no further authorization is required. Therefore felicity is exhausted by internal linguistic propriety.

Ob V: Barthian Theology declares that since human speech cannot bear divine truth as such, God alone speaks truly. If this is the case, talk of Spirit authorized human felicity collapses either into interpretation or into an incoherent hybrid of divine and human speech. 

Responsiones

Ad I: Speech act theory correctly identifies conditions governing the successful performance of human acts within social practices, but it does not account for the authorization of speech to bear divine truth. Austinian felicity concerns whether an act counts as performed within a convention; theological felicity concerns whether an utterance is permitted to stand as faithful speech under the Word. The Spirit is not an additional pragmatic condition alongside human conventions, but the agent who grants authority to speak in the name of the Word. Speech act theory explains how acts function; it cannot explain how creaturely speech becomes obedient proclamation rather than autonomous performance.

Ad II: Orthodoxy is necessary but not sufficient. One may confess correct propositions without the Spirit’s life. Felicity requires authorization, not merely accuracy.

Ad III: Authenticity is indexical to the self; felicity is ordered to the Logos. Theological speech is not self-expression but participation in divine speech.

Ad IV: Rule following governs the form of theological language, not its authority. An utterance may be grammatically correct, inferentially coherent, and ecclesially recognizable, yet remain unauthorised speech. Felicity does not arise from conformity to linguistic rules alone, nor does it emerge from participation in a linguistic practice as such. Rather, the Holy Spirit authorizes a rule governed utterance to stand as faithful speech under the Word. Grammar determines what can be said; the Spirit determines whether it may be said.

Ad V: Barth is correct to deny that human speech can, by its own capacity, bear divine truth. Yet this denial does not exclude Spirit authorized human speech; it presupposes it. The Spirit does not convert human words into divine words by interpretation, nor does He replace human speech with divine monologue. Instead, He authorizes creaturely utterance to function as obedient proclamation. Felicity names the mode by which God’s speech becomes present in human speech without ceasing to be God’s act or the creature’s act. Human speech remains human in form and origin, yet becomes faithful by divine authorization.

Nota

Felicity is the Spirit’s bridging act between the ontological donation of the res (Disp. LII) and the faithful assertion of truth (Disp. L). It is the pneumatic fitting of human speech to divine being. Thus, we can claim the following about the Trinity: 

• The Father constitutes truth.

• The Son is present as truth.

• The Spirit donates the res and authorizes the word.

Felicity is the Spirit’s signature on human speech because without felicity doctrine becomes mere abstraction, the sacrament becomes only a symbol, preaching is only exhortation, and theology remains only grammar. However, with felicity doctrine becomes light; the sacrament becomes communion; preaching becomes divine address; and theology becomes true participation.

Determinatio

We determine that:

1. Felicity is Spirit-authored, not humanly achieved.

2. A theological utterance is felicitous when the Spirit authorizes it to stand as faithful speech under the Word.”

3. Felicity unites presence, donation, and truth, completing the semantic-ontological structure of theological meaning.

4. The Spirit’s act is the condition of faithful, truthful, and effective theological speech.

5. Thus, the Spirit makes human speech a participation in divine discourse.

Transitus ad Disputationem LIV

Having established that the Spirit authorizes speech to carry the divine res, we now turn to the final structural element of our semantic theory and ask as to why divine acts require a hyperintensional semantics. For if felicity depends on Spirit-authorization rather than mere extension or modal profile, then divine acts must be individuated at a finer semantic grain than extensional or modal semantics allow.

Thus, we proceed to Disputatio LIV: De Hyperintensionalitate Divinae Operationis: Utrum Actus Dei Non Sint Reducibiles ad Extensiones vel Possibilia, in which we ask whether divine acts differ in such a fine-grained manner that no extensional or modal semantics can capture their truth.