Akdağ, Özcan, Gazâlî ve Aquino’lu Thomas’a Göre Tanrı’nın Özgürlüğü (Doktora Tezi), Erciyes Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Kayseri 2015

Reviewed by: Divine Action and Emergence: An Alternative to Panentheism by Mariusz Tabaczek Michael J. Dodds O.P. TABACZEK, Mariusz. Divine Action and Emergence: An Alternative to Panentheism. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2021. xviii + 346 pp. Cloth, $75.00 This book is written against the background of a paradigm shift currently taking place in science, away from reductionism and toward the theory of emergence (EM) and downward causation (DC). The theory asserts that an emergent whole, whether a biological organism or a dynamic system, cannot be explained by its parts. The book evaluates a number of theologians who have embraced this theory in their accounts of divine action and concludes with an alternative account based on the theology of Aquinas. Tabaczek initially investigated the theory of emergence in his earlier work, Emergence: Towards a New Metaphysics and Philosophy of Science (2019). There, he explained how a neo-Aristotelian dispositional [End Page 603] metaphysics may serve as an ontological ground for emergentism. He begins the present work by summarizing and developing those arguments. Recognizing the inadequacy of the "classical" version of the theory of emergence that employs efficient causality to account for downward causation, Tabaczek turns to the "dynamical depth" account of emergence, developed by Terrence Deacon, that employs the notion of "constitutive absences" or constraints to explain the emergence of complexity and specialization. He finds, however, that Deacon's theory also fails to provide an ontology of the emergent whole. Many contemporary thinkers employ Aristotle's philosophy of causation in their discussions of emergence, but often without adequate understanding. Tabaczek therefore offers a masterful review of Aristotle's actual teaching and shows its relation to the dispositionalism of the New Aristotelianism. The main concern of the present work is theological. Tabaczek notes that theologians who employ emergence in their account of divine action frequently anchor their theology in panentheism, the theory that the world is somehow in God and that God is both in the world and somehow more than the world. God influences the world, but the world also affects God. The theory requires that, to avoid interfering with the world, God's power and knowledge must be somehow limited. Tabaczek finds that such theology "calls into question the classical understanding of God as immutable, omniscient, omnipotent, infinite, eternal, and impassible." He argues that "the concept of God's self-limitation of the divine attributes … leads to an image of God as a superintelligent and a superpowerful agent, yet not a truly divine one." Tabaczek's aim is "to critically evaluate emergentist panentheism within the circles of the theology–science dialogue and to propose an alternative theological interpretation of emergence in terms of the classical and the new Aristotelianism and the Thomistic concept of the concurrent action of God in the universe." He develops an interpretation of divine action that preserves the traditional, transcendent divine attributes while affirming God's immanence in the world. His model of divine action is "built in reference to both the classical DC-based and Deacon's dynamic depth views of EM (reinterpreted in terms of the classical and new Aristotelianism) and the classical Aristotelian-Thomistic view of the God-world relationship." It provides "an important alternative to the emergentist panentheism developed by Peacocke and supported by Clayton and Niels Henrik Gregersen." Tabaczek presents an insightful review and critique of theologians who employ panentheism and emergentism in their account of divine action. In so doing, he unearths some serious theological problems with panentheism in general and emergentist panentheism in particular. He finds a troublesome ambiguity with the notion of "in" (en) not only in the claims of panentheism regarding the God-world relationship but also in the very term "pan en theism" itself. He also spots an unresolved tension between the notions of divine transcendence and immanence. The issue [End Page 604] of theodicy arises with the claim that the world, with all its natural and moral evils, is somehow "in" God. Finally, there is a tendency to view God as a univocal cause, belonging to the same order as natural causes. Inpresenting his theory of emergence and divine action, Tabaczek first offers a magisterial review of Aquinas's account...

493 BOOK REVIEWS Unlocking Divine Action: Contemporary Science and Thomas Aquinas. By MICHAEL DODDS. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2012. Pp. 328. $70.00 (cloth). ISBN: 978-0-81321989 -9. Although no one can deny that the scientific revolution of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was an unmixed blessing in terms of the advance of technology, medicine, and our more detailed knowledge of the natural world, in terms of natural philosophy and metaphysics its effects have been more ambiguous. An exclusive focus on quantifiable forces has blinded us to many modes of natural causality, modes of long standing among the ancient and medieval philosophers. Furthermore, insofar as theology has often presupposed certain truths of or at least modeled itself on natural science, the scientific revolution likewise handicapped us in our attempts to understand divine causality. In Unlocking Divine Action, Michael Dodds first defends these claims—which have in various ways been canvassed before—but then goes much further: Dodds argues that, in spite of this legacy, there are signs that recent science is returning to the older, broader understanding of causality, and thereby equipping philosophers and theologians observing science to “unlock” divine action. The first two chapters are directed toward the claim that science since around the time of Newton narrowed our understanding of what it is to be a cause. The first chapter covers the prescientific understanding of causality as presented by Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas. In what amounts to a gloss on books 1 and 2 of the Physics, Dodds lays out carefully, and yet with minimal jargon, the four causes and chance, finding the delicate balance of precision and accessibility. The second chapter discusses the project of Bacon, Descartes, Newton, and others as they decided either to truncate, ignore, or explicitly reject the notions of formal and final causality in favor of a constricted notion of efficient causality, where the only agent worthy of consideration is that of a quantifiable, and therefore measurable, force emanating from and acting on ultimate particles. This part of the book does not break new ground, but its clarity and its manifest relevance as a premise make it worthwhile. In the third chapter Dodds makes a connection often missed: an effect of the success and dominance of Newtonian science was an application of its notion of causality to both natural and sacred theology. God’s causality could only be that of a force acting on atoms; any other consideration was as 494 BOOK REVIEWS obsolete as Aristotle’s substantial forms and geocentric universe. Thinking of God as just another source of forces—in fact, one that interfered with the very order he himself had established—caused perplexity among many scientists, philosophers, and theologians about how God could interact with the cosmos. Likewise, it led many to reject the possibility of miracles because of the apparently incoherent view of nature that divine intervention suggested. The clockmaker God of the Deists, the liberal theologians following Bultmann, and the pantheist-leaning process theologians all agreed, under the influence of the force-paradigm, that God was forbidden miracles. Further, in an effort to uphold the “autonomy of creation” and to avoid imputing a violent coercion of our wills to God, they even felt compelled to reduce or limit divine omnipotence and omniscience. God ended up “locked out” of nature. The remaining four chapters of the book are devoted to picking this lock. In chapters 4 and 5 Dodds shows how many discoveries in contemporary science—that is, science in the last century or later, since the advent of quantum theory—are opening scientists’ minds to other possibilities of the idea of causality. These two chapters are divided according to a crucial distinction about the relation between science and theology. On the one hand, a theologian might import a theory from science, basing theological conclusions on it as on a premise. On the other hand, a theologian might incorporate the ideas hinted at, or even fundamentally presupposed, in a scientific theory. Chapter 4 follows attempts at the former vis-à-vis divine action, as pursued in recent decades by several philosophers, the majority of whom (one quickly notices from the footnotes) are in...

The God-World Relationship -Monism and Monotheism-rnIn this study, the approaches of monism and monotheism to the God and the world relationship and the concepts of God revealed by this approach are examined comparatively. This study consists of an introduction, two chapters, and a conclusion. In the introduction, the problem related to the causality relationship between God and the world is revealed in the context of monism and monotheism through the discussions of whether there is a reason for the existence of the world. The first chapter focuses primarily on what monism means conceptually within philosophical debates and how it is presented as an ontological thesis with reference to some historical examples. Later, the concepts of God put forward on the basis of monism are explained with reference to the views of three philosophers who have historically embraced monism: Plotinus, Spinoza and Hegel. In this context, first of all, the monistic arguments of the above-mentioned philosophers and the God-world identity views based on this approach are included, and it is concluded that an immanent causal understanding established between God and the world, which is common in these approaches, is insufficient to explain the God-world relationship. In the second chapter, in the context of the God-world relationship of monotheism as opposed to monism, first of all, the conceptual and doctrinal meaning of monotheism is emphasized. For this purpose, firstly, the idea of transcendence, being the main determinant of the God-world relationship in monotheism, is put forward and solutions are sought for the philosophical problems stemming from this idea. Secondly, in monotheism, the immanent dimension of the God-world relationship is defined with reference to the omnipresence and the creativity of God, in a way that does not contradict the idea of transcendence. At this point, the focus is especially on the creation doctrine of monotheism; the immanent dimension of God’s relationship with the world is analyzed in depth through the relationship of creation and will as well as the relationship of creation and conservation, and thus, solutions are sought for the arising problems. As a result, in the context of monotheism, the importance of defining the immanent dimension of the God-world relationship in a consistent manner that would not contradict the transcendence is underlined.rnKeywords: Monism; Monotheism; Pantheism; Panentheism; Transcendence; Immanence; Creation.

The aim of the article is presentation of two concepts of human individuality which have arisen in modern Polish philosophy of Mieczysław Gogacz and Stanisław Judycki. It is an attempt to look at the problem from two different philosophical perspectives: Thomistic metaphysics and phenomenological epistemology. Metaphysical approach is searching for an answer to the question about human individuality in their ontic structure, whereas phenomenological approach focuses on the analysis of a direct experience. As reason of individuality, Gogacz indicates potential intellect (passive) subjected in a substantial form (soul). Judycki maintains that this reason is the concept of God, according to whom He creates a soul of every human being as radically different from all other human souls, unique. Presented theories develop from a different way of understanding a human being. Gogacz’s theory has a substantial character, refers to the concept of a human of Aristotle, Boethius and St. Thomas Aquinas. Judycki’s concept is a relational approach, modified by elements of substantialist philosophy. He refers to relational approach of Plato, Saint Augustine and Descartes as well as substantialist theories of Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas. Thomistic and phenomenological approaches to individuality introduce fundamentally different and essential substance to philosophy concerning human beings.

Celem artykułu jest przedstawienie dwóch koncepcji indywidualności osoby ludzkiej, powstałych we współczesnej filozofii polskiej: Mieczysława Gogacza i Stanisława Judyckiego. Jest to próba spojrzenia na zagadnienie z dwóch różnych perspektyw filozoficznych: metafizyki tomistycznej i epistemologii fenomenologicznej. Ujęcie metafizyczne jest poszukiwaniem odpowiedzi na pytanie o indywidualność osoby w jej strukturze ontycznej, ujęcie fenomenologiczne natomiast koncentruje się na analizie doświadczenia bezpośredniego. Jako rację indywidualności Gogacz wskazuje intelekt możnościowy (bierny) zapodmiotowany w formie substancjalnej (duszy). Judycki utrzymuje, że racją tą jest zamysł Boga, zgodnie z którym stwarza On duszę każdego człowieka jako radykalnie różną od wszystkich innych dusz ludzkich – unikalną. Przedstawione teorie wyrastają z odmiennego sposobu rozumienia osoby. Teoria Gogacza ma charakter substancjalistyczny, nawiązuje do koncepcji osoby Arystotelesa, Boecjusza i św. Tomasza z Akwinu. Koncepcja Judyckiego jest ujęciem relacjonistycznym, zmodyfikowanym elementami filozofii substancjalistycznej. Odwołuje się do relacjonistycznych teorii Platona, św. Augustyna i Kartezjusza oraz substancjalistycznych – Arystotelesa i św. Tomasza z Akwinu. Tomistyczne i fenomenologiczne ujęcia indywidualności wprowadzają do filozoficznej nauki o człowieku niesprowadzalne do siebie, lecz istotne treści.

Following the first three volumes in the series on divine action, this fourth and final volume seeks a prescriptive account of God as an agent. Christian systematic theology raises deep metaphysical questions about the central concepts we use in our thinking about God. One of these central concepts bequeathed by the Christian tradition is that God is an agent. While volumes 2 and 3 offered a wide range of specific divine actions offered in the canonical Christian tradition, the question of how to articulate this basic conviction arises. In this volume, Abraham expounds the concept of God as agent by applying it to various traditional problems in Christian doctrine like the relation of freedom and grace, divine action in liberation theology, the presence of God in the Eucharist, divine providence, the relationship of Christianity and Islam, the relation of the natural sciences to theology and apparent design, and the realm of the demonic. In keeping with the argument of the tetralogy as a whole, specific divine actions are the points of departure for reflection on these topics. The book aims not only to clarify the concept of God as an agent but also to articulate solutions to these traditional problems. It is designed to be the launchpad for further research in divine agency and divine action and how an account of God as an agent can throw fresh light on old theological and philosophical problems.

New Atheism declares God to be “a scientific hypothesis” that can be tested like any other. An examination of their claim, and the approaches they employ to substantiate it, reveals a particular understanding of God and causality, where God’s action would entail an observable rupture of causal closure. The modern Western intelligent design (ID) movement posits very specific ID arguments, all of which, under examination, share assumptions about an external designer and the nature of the designing act. The argument from irreducible complexity entails more than an object’s irreducibility, but particularly the idea that natural causal mechanisms are inadequate to account for the complex object. Specified complexity argues that certain patterns of information cannot come about by natural processes alone. The fine-tuning argument also presupposes a lack of plausible naturalistic explanations for the universal constants identified by science. It becomes clear that they share an underlying assumption of the New Atheists’ “God hypothesis,” that a complete, natural causal account would render the resulting phenomena unconvincing as evidence for an external designer’s existence. These assumptions are compared with the concept of God’s action in the divine action models (DAMs) of the three Sunnī theological schools: Ashʿarī, Māturīdī, and Salafī. Upon examination, all three models assume a maximally active God and allow natural phenomena to be accounted for by continuous and unbroken natural causal processes. The paper concludes that Sunnī concepts of God’s divine action are immune to New Atheist critiques, particularly their manner of weaponizing science against religion, because the underlying assumptions about God are different. Moreover, the responses to New Atheism made by the Western ID movement are equally inapplicable from the standpoint of Sunnī DAMs, since those responses share with New Atheism metaphysical assumptions the DAMs dismiss.

Email: marketing@brill.com Comparing Avicenna’s and Thomas Aquinas’ positions regarding human knowledge, this volumes talks about God and the nature of the creative action and the beginning of the universe. The overall argument of the book is that their conception of theological language plays an important role in shaping their positions concerning the creation of the universe. In the first part, their conception of the theological language and divine formal features are explored and how their positions regarding theological language differ from each other is discussed. The second part includes a comparison of their conceptions of the nature of the divine creative action—which provides a good example showing how their conceptions of theological language affect the way they talk about creation—and their arguments concerning the beginning of the universe.

Deism from the beginning has positioned itself as a heterodox religious identity contrary to orthodoxy. In this regard, it is the review of established classical theological presuppositions regarding the following headings: conception of God; God-world relationship; religion-science relationship; ethical considerations regarding the problem of evil, etc. In these contexts, deism could be seen as a sort of religious self-criticism. As arose in British philosophical-theological circles, deism sounds to have resisted some conventional Christian presuppositions as put forward by E. Herbert of Cherbury, the father of English deism, in the forthcoming articles: “There is a supreme God. This sovereign deity should be worshipped. Virtue arises from the piety created by this worship. As the man is filled with wickedness, he needs repentance, which means communication with this sovereign Being. There is reward or punishment in the life to come.” In the course of time, different kinds of deisms turned up, ranging from accepting God as a sublime creator alone and rejecting revelation, i.e., institutional religion, to those accepting religion on the condition that it should be compatible with reason. Samuel Clarke mentions the arguments of different kinds of deists and skillfully criticizes them. Historical and contemporary deism have the following in common: “The compromise between truth of revelation and truth of reason; saving knowledge versus saving faith; rejection of institutional structures; glorification of reason and human nature; ethical rationality.” With this doctrinal backdrop, hot debates on deism in Turkey have recently gotten new dimensions. Figures showing the rise of deism in recent years under an Islamist political rule makes the case all the more thought-provoking. The visibility of religion in the public sphere has increased, and the rate of religiosity would also be expected to increase. However, the result is quite the opposite. There is a widespread and remarkable secularization in conservative circles. After they got the political power and economic welfare, which enabled them to attain worldly glory, they have gradually left religious glory behind and glorified profanity. In this case, deism seems to take the form of secularized orthodoxy. Deists in Turkey, rather than rejecting revealed religion they want it to be compatible with reason, to demythologize it from supernatural narratives, and to find a way of getting rid of fanatical elements in the religion. They want to replace religious institutional authority with the authority of reason, which rests itself on innate ideas and a priori truths. They claim ethical rationality, which means ethical truths are accessible through reasoning. My study tackles some statistical data specifically signifying why youngsters tend to claim to be deists. Some surveys among high school students have been included in the study and due evaluations have been made. It seems sectarian identities, radical voices, authoritative religious language, blockades to freedom of speech, a dichotomy between religious and scientific facts in the curricula and mythological religious language are among the reasons counted by the youngster to reject conventional religion and embrace deism. The mainstream theological tradition of Islam is quite familiar with deistic claims. The discussions on deism will finally bring the enlightened minds together with the reasonable religious line.

PROVIDENCE AND SCIENCE IN A WORLD OF CONTINGENCY: Thomas Aquinas' Metaphysics of Divine Action by Ignacio Silva. Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2022. 170 pages. Paperback; $52.95. ISBN: 9781032002781. *Ignacio Silva (DPhil, Oxford) is an Argentinian theologian who specializes in the dialogue between science and theology. This book is a proposal for fellow scholars and others to reconsider the contribution of Thomas Aquinas's metaphysics as a means of resolving the question of divine action in the light of science. Although Aquinas is the thirteenth century's most famous friar and Catholicism's most renowned theological authority alongside Augustine, he is often viewed today as contributing few insights as regards an allegedly "modern" argument. *Silva argues that Aquinas supplies a way of getting beyond two mistaken views held by people today: (1) on the one hand, that God needs the natural world to be fundamentally open to outside influence; and (2) on the other hand, that God causes things to exist in a way that is similar to the way other natural causes cause things to occur. *Silva's goal is to get beyond the current situation in which "many today find it necessary to search for a lack of natural causation so as to find a space for God to act" (p. 139). According to this way of thinking, God's actions are only localized occasions, hence the school of thought known as occasionalism. Conversely, another tendency is for believers to argue that God's powers are self-restricted in order to account for natural powers. The latter point of view is sometimes stipulated in terms of the biblical concept of kenosis ("Christ ... emptied himself," Phil. 2:7). *Silva's main point concerns a correct notion of causation such that we not restrict divine providence to an inadequate understanding of causation: "the idea of requiring insufficient causation for God to act depends on a deterministic notion of causation that, ultimately, renders God to act as a cause among causes" (p. 49). Silva holds that much causation is subject to chance contingencies. Thus, Silva's strategy is to think of causation in the context of potency and act. This allows a fresh and fuller way of dealing with the four parameters of divine providence: God's omnipotence, God's involvement with nature, nature's autonomy, and the success of science. The scope of the inquiry is enormous and Silva's handling of the thought of Thomas Aquinas is, unsurprisingly, difficult, yet hugely beneficial. *On the one hand, readers must be prepared for a dense tutorial in accounts of causality, powers, natures, and other metaphysical categories in order to appreciate the argument of this book. On the other hand, the argument over the relationship between God as the creating cause of the world and the secondary causes that act to create other effects in the world, is startlingly simple. It is best understood as a form of instrumental causality according to Silva. It is analogized (as so much of Aquinas's theology is) as follows: "The knife is moved by the man to cut, and to do it in such a manner. Without the man's power, the knife could not cut, but without the edge of the knife, the man could not cut in this manner ... the effect is both produced completely by God and by the natural agent ... (p. 129)." *Thus, without God, nature would not have the necessary powers to cause the effects it possesses. Without those natural efficient causes, God's power could not be effective. There is no split between divine and natural causation in any given effect; both are completely causal of any given effect. It is analogically helpful, although Silva does not discuss this idea, to invoke here the Incarnation of Jesus Christ: he is both fully divine and fully human, not half of each. *God acts in three ways: through creation itself, through natural (secondary) causes, and through three types of miracles--although, sadly, the latter do not receive much attention in this book. But the threefold action of God is intended to counter, on the one hand, the view that causality is always deterministic and, on the other hand, that God's action in the universe endangers nature's autonomy. *For some readers, the most difficult aspect of the argument will be the presentation of natural entities' powers of operation in terms of the four Aristotelian causes. The key is to think of causation in context. From Aristotle, change is a key feature of contingency. Change is organized into potency and act, essence and accident. These categories explain how causation results in real life. Moreover, theologically speaking, for Aquinas, "affirming that natural things do not operate, and that it is only God who does, diminishes the divine power" (p. 98, quoting the Summa contra Gentiles III, c 69). This is the counterintuitive power of the Thomist position. It opposes the view that attributes all natural causes to God's intervention. Holding that view would mean, in the end, that God actually does not create anything apart from God. But for God to create a world means to distinguish something apart from God and to allow contingency to exist in the spatio-temporal realm. The key point about the distinction between the eternal and the temporal realms is to ask why God creates in this way. Silva casually mentions that "God acts through natural causes because of the immensity of his goodness ..." (p. 101). So, it is not a matter of metaphysical necessity that lies behind the Thomist view, it is God's goodness that is the key. *The position that created natural things are themselves creative needs to be exactingly well laid out; otherwise this position will be perceived as a way of extracting God from the world altogether. Here, Silva stipulates that "God's causality penetrates most intimately the causality of created natural things," while God upholds the creation "in its being" (p. 99). This is uncontroversial, but the provision for miracles is bound to raise questions about why God would act in this way. What Silva could have used are some examples of why some philosophers dissent from Aquinas on miracles, with responses to those dissents. *Silva covers an enormous amount of reflection on the notion of causality, including some original and highly potent insights. He claims that final causality is the "cause of the efficient cause in terms of its causality" (p. 71). This relationship, as well as the relationship between the material and formal cause, as first demarcated by Aristotle, is laid out in dense, logical prose. The book ends with some subtle yet significant comments on the differences between Aquinas's views and those of twentieth-century thinkers such as Austin Farrer, who referred to Aquinas in proposing a double agency account of creation while resorting to fideism. Farrer refused to suggest any explanation for the causal joint between God's creation and the world's operation. This analysis is original and should have been given more prominence. There is, indeed, a great deal of difference between fulsome and evasive double agency accounts of created causality; however, Silva ignores almost completely the medieval development of the theorem of the "supernatural," which came about because of the theoretical stance taken by Philip the Chancellor (d. 1236). This lapse is not critical, but it does exemplify the lack of a historical dimension to the book's argument. *Another quandary concerns the book's form of exposition. It is largely descriptive. While its argument details Aquinas's metaphysics of causal relations and the universe's created dependency on God, it lacks a dialectical edge. Although the argument is sufficiently sound, it is in need of an engagement with the open theists and others who would contest the account of divine power that Thomas Aquinas developed. There are quite a few references to other contemporary positions on providence and causality, especially in the final chapter. The names of William Carroll, Robert Russell, and Michael Dodds appear, but there could have been a more probing engagement of these contemporary voices. The Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics is treated in the light of the proposed view of moderate determinism in contrast to the non-interventionist, objective (NIODA) view of divine action in Robert Russell. Here, I'm unsure whether NIODA has been properly interpreted. Although I think Silva's position is correct, is Russell's understanding of God's causality really reducible to natural causality as Silva contends? The textual citations for this allegation are not convincing. *Finally, despite what I take to be a largely satisfying account of God's creative action, the issue of evil and theodicy are not dealt with in this book. Aquinas makes contingency (and accidents in general) central for the notion of creation. Silva sees contingency as a sign of the perfection of divine providence, but this contradiction (between created contingency and the fact of natural "evil") is a real difficulty for God's involvement with evil or deficient effects in creation. Regardless, altogether this is a provocative, dense volume that could easily have been double the length if key problems had received more comprehensive treatment. *Reviewed by Paul Allen, Academic Dean, Corpus Christi College, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC V6T 1J7.

Providence and Science in a World of Contingency: Thomas Aquinas’ Metaphysics of Divine Action

Revolutionary scientific discoveries in this century, particularly in the area of cosmology, have made the question of divine action in the created world a controversial one. While conservative theologians hold on to a medieval world view in which God acts in and guides a closed universe that comfortably fits “in the palm of God’s hand,” others have abandoned the medieval view to confront the challenges posed by the new cosmology. A universe in which chance, chaos, and complex interactions comprise the physical fabric compels theologians to interpret divine action in radically new ways. The myriad of books and articles on this subject within the last ten years is an indication that the new cosmology is calling for a new theology. While the efforts of scholars to discern the role of God in creation are commendable, they are, at the same time, circumscribed by the notion of God as unified being. The Christian version of Aristotle’s unmoved mover, thanks to the genius of Thomas Aquinas, has compelled scholars to speak of God as a single agent acting in the world. While the notion of God as absolute being is not disputed, it tends to obscure the fact that the Christian God is a trinity of persons and acts in the world as trinity. In this paper I will explore God’s action in the world not as being but as absolute and self-diffusive good, an idea based on the theology of the Franciscan theologian, Bonaventure. For Bonaventure, God is trinity precisely because God is by nature a self-diffusive good. My thesis is that God acts in the world as the good and this good is the love of the triune God. Since the good is hidden in the ordinary events of the universe, I propose that divine love is a humble love that undergirds the creativity of the physical world and allows the goodness of the world to unfold, revealing the universe as the heart of God.

Despite many theological and biblical interpretations, very little work has explored how individuals develop their own concepts of God’s actions and providence. This omission is unfortunate, as exploring divine and human providence from a psychological perspective provides an opportunity to understand whether some ideas and concepts have originated based on cultural influence and/or biases in our cognition. This chapter presents work that shows how early development of cognition influences how we understand human and divine action. The study of child development provides a window into the cognitive patterns of early ideas of the natural and supernatural world. Although there has not yet been a study testing children’s direct intuitions or thoughts about human and divine action and providence, there is a body of research that would suggest that children already have rich ideas about other humans and God’s involvement in the world. Ultimately, this chapter argues that an early developing understanding of God is one who is present, immanent, and active within the world, and this is differentiated with humans who are also present and active but limited. Based on cognitive developmental work, our developing, intuitive notion of divine providence seems to be that God (and humans) should act benevolently within the world.

Reviewed by: Genèse du Dieu souverain (Archéologie de la puissance II) by Gwenaëlle Aubry Martin Pickavé Gwenaëlle Aubry. Genèse du Dieu souverain (Archéologie de la puissance II). Bibliothèque d'Histoire de la Philosophie. Paris: Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin, 2018. Pp. 320. Paper, €36.00. As the subtitle indicates, and the introduction explains in more detail, this is a sequel to Aubry's 2006 book, Dieu sans la puissance. Dunamis et energeia chez Aristote et chez Plotin. In the present as well as in the previous studies, the author traces the developments and transformations undergone by the notion of power (dunamis, potentia) and in particular how these transformations affect the understanding of God. Whereas the first study follows the development from Aristotle's account of the divine being to Plotinus, the present volume covers, in five densely written chapters, medieval philosophers from Augustine to John Duns Scotus. According to the author, the history of the notion of power reflects two broad shifts, which she sets out to explore in her overall project: one from an Aristotelian ontology based on the act-potency distinction to an ontology relying on the distinction between power and action, and another from a God of pure actuality to an omnipotent God. Despite the overall ambition, it is best to approach this book as a set of almost independent studies around the problem of divine omnipotence. In the first chapter, the author examines Augustine's views on divine omnipotence. As Aubry points out, divine omnipotence goes hand in hand with divine goodness for Augustine. That God is good does not mean that God's omnipotence is restricted, nor can God's omnipotence be a reason for abandoning what is good. She points to Augustine's struggle with Manicheanism as one of the motives behind the strong link between goodness and omnipotence, and deals with some of the problems Augustine's account seems to face. For why is there evil and damnation if God is not only good but also all powerful? This is an incredibly rich chapter, which also covers Augustine's views on powers in creatures. Not all medieval authors managed to maintain the delicate balance between divine goodness and omnipotence. In the second chapter, Aubry contrasts two thinkers, Peter Damian and Peter Abelard, who drew completely opposing consequences from divine [End Page 814] omnipotence. Whereas for Peter Damian it guarantees the radical contingency of the creation, for Abelard it means that the existing created world is the best possible world, which also means that it was necessary for God to create it as it is. As Aubry shows convincingly, their differences in how they understand and prioritize divine goodness lead them to their diverging conclusions. The third (and shortest) chapter examines how the understanding of divine omnipotence changes during the thirteenth century up to the condemnations of 1277 and contrasts this development with the emergence of the famous distinction between God's absolute and ordained power. The author makes a good case for what she calls the autonomisation of divine omnipotence during this period. The last two chapters deal with two main figures in medieval philosophy: Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus. Aquinas provides Aubry with a good case study for how the Aristotelian idea of God as pure actuality is thought to be compatible with a conception of God as omnipotent. Although the main preoccupations of the previous chapters take a back seat here, this compact section does a good job elucidating Aquinas's conception of the first being and how the latter can shed light on Aquinas's ontology of created beings. Not surprisingly, the chapter on Duns Scotus takes up his novel account of the will and contingency, which has major implications for how Duns Scotus conceives of divine omnipotence; for it is here, as the author argues, that we can find contingency transferred from what is in potency to the omnipotence of the first cause. Unlike other books covering ambitious topics over a period of almost nine hundred years, Aubry's study avoids hopping from one canonical figure to the next. In this very erudite book, she gives voice not only to Augustine, Aquinas...

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