Current Seminar:
• Augustine's De Trinitate
2/24/2007
Book XI, Prologue, Chapters 1-2
Br. Dunstan Robidoux, OSB
In the Prologue of Book 11, Augustine notes that, since we are incarnate beings, trinitarian images can be found not only within our souls but
also in our bodily life and in the life of the senses. Acts of seeing, among the different senses, come across as the best analogy that we
can use when we want to talk about human cognition. Oddly enough, the same perspective is taken up by Edmund Husserl in his
phenomenology. Human sight is taken as a paradigm for human cognition. To see something is to understand and know it.
Turning to chapter 1, Augustine identifies a trinity in our human experience of vision. Through self-reflection on our acts of seeing, three
elements can be identified: a body or object seen, an act of seeing, and an intentionality which directs one’s seeing to the seeing of a particular
body or object. Without reflection, self-reflection, it would not be possible to distinguish between an act of seeing and the content of what is
seen since, in our ordinary consciousness of things, we do not distinguish between act and content. The two seem always to go together. In
Augustine’s account, he appears to talk about an act of seeing as a kind of reception since an object that is seen plays a role as an agent object
which acts on one’s sense of sight to “beget a form as a likeness of itself.” An object seen does not beget the sense but it does beget a form
that is received by an act of seeing. Certain objects, one might argue, are more seeable than other objects. Augustine’s account appears
to suggest that, in seeing, an interaction occurs between inner and outer conditions (which is a position that was later taken up by Aquinas and more
fully explained and analyzed).
In chapter 2, Augustine moves back from outer experience to inner experience, from bodily experience to inner experience that is known as one
reflects on what is happening within one’s soul. Another trinitarian image or analogy emerges as one attends to acts of remembering, the
contents of what is being remembered, and an intentionality which exists in acts of remembering that elicit acts of recall within remembering so
that one’s memory becomes preoccupied with remembering certain things and not others. As with acts of seeing, in one activity there are three
constitutive elements which each have a different nature though all form together in an interpenetrating way to constitutive one reality. And
again, it is by self-reflection that one is able to distinguish parts that normally one does not think about. It is not uncommon that, in
the middle of experience, persons cannot distinguish between an act of remembering and what it is that is being remembered. Please note that,
if one looks at Aquinas and his early discussions pertaining to a philosophy of mind, what Augustine refers to as memory is referred to as an
experience of one’s self as one attends to the data of one’s conscious acts. Whenever we attend to the data of our consciousness, our
self-experience, we are calling to mind, we are remembering what has been going on inside. In chapter 2, Augustine refers to the role of
imagination which has a positive role to play in our conscious lives although, admittedly, imagination can run wild and lead to abuses. Hence,
if abuses are to be avoided, one’s conscious life must be directed away from bodily things and toward a life of the spirit. If our imaginative
lives are properly cultivated, they lead to growth in understanding and wisdom. In the end, however, Augustine finds that remembering is not a
good analogy for moving toward a better understanding of the Trinity. Remembering is too dependent on acts of seeing for it to be a suitable
analogy for a growth in understanding which wants to understand something which exists independently of material conditions.
|
