A Estrutura Metafísica do Ser Incriado e dos Seres Criados no de Trinitate de Severino Boécio

Abstract

In the De Trinitate, Boethius presents the threefold division of the speculative science and shows that, although natural sciences, mathematics and theology share the same primary object - form - these sciences can be distinguished by the way they face it. Theology, the highest form of human speculation and to which all wise men should devote themselves to, considers intellectually the true and pure form, which Boethius identifies with the divine substance, the being in se and with the source of being. The divine substance is pure form, form without mater and it is this simplicity that allows him to say that God est id quod est (here understood as essence). In God there is an identification between his being and his form that can not occur in creatures. As things composed by matter and form, all creatures owe there being to the parts that compose them and are those parts conjointly; form is, therefore, just a part of their whole reality and thus there can not be an identification between their form and their essence (and consequently, creatures are not id quod sunt), The creature’s form derives from the form that is apart from matter and as such it must be distinguished from the true form and designated by image. In this work we try to show how Boethius uses the ideas of simplicity and composition to enunciate the ontological difference between creatures and their creator.