D. 8 - Angels and the assumption of bodies

Division of the text

Here the Master considers the good and wicked angels with regard to their assumption of bodies. And it is divided into two parts.

In the first, he considers them with regard to the assumption of bodies.

Second, he considers them with regard to their being thrust into us, at it also seems worthy of consideration whether demons . . . enter the bodies of men substantially. (Sent. II, 8.4(46).1.)

The first is divided into two parts.

In the first, he considers the apparition of angels in bodily forms, whether it is through an assumed body or one naturally united to them.

In the second, he considers the divine apparition, at nor is it to be doubted that God appeared in bodily forms to men. (Sent. II, 8.2(44).1.)

There he does two things.

First, he says that God has appeared in bodily forms.

Second, he shows that God has never appeared visibly in his essence, at leaving aside these matters as too deep and obscure, let us hold this without doubt: that God never appeared to mortals in the form of his essence. (Sent. II, 8.3(45).)

Concerning the first, he does two things.

First, he shows that God has appeared in visible forms.

Second, he inquires about the manner of the aforementioned apparition, at but in asserting that God appeared to men in bodily likenesses, he poses a perplexing question. (Sent. II, 8.2(44).2, referring to Augustine.)

Question 1

The angels and the assumption of bodies

Here six questions are asked:

first, whether angels have bodies naturally united;

second, if they do not have them, whether they assume them;

third, if so, in what manner do they assume bodies to themselves;

fourth, what activities do they exercise through them;

fifth, in what manner can they force their way into us;

sixth, how does God appear in bodily forms.

Article 1

Whether the angels have bodies united to them

To the first we proceed as follows. (Parallel texts: ST I.50.1; 51.1; SCG II.46, 49, and 91; On the Power of God, q. 6, a. 6; On Evil, q. 16, a. 1; On Spiritual Creatures, a. 5.) It seems that angels have bodies united to them.

Obj. 1: For Augustine in the City of God (Augustine, The City of God, bk. 8, ch. 16 (CCSL 48; PL 41:241).) cites the words of Apuleius, who defines demons in this way: demons are animals in genus, passive in spirit, rational in mind, composed of air in body, eternal in time. Nor does he disapprove of this definition. Therefore, it seems that they have aerial bodies naturally united to them.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, Gregory says in a Homily on the Epiphany (Gregory the Great, Homilies on the Gospels, bk. 1, homily 10, para. 1 (CCSL 141; PL 76:1110).) that a “rational animal,” that is, an angel, announced the Incarnation of Christ to the Jews. But an animal is composed of soul and body. Therefore, it seems that angels have bodies naturally united to them.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, that which in itself is incorporeal cannot be called “corporeal” in any respect, since these are predicated absolutely. For what is white absolutely is not black in any respect. But, according to Damascene (John Damascene, On the Orthodox Faith, bk. 2, ch. 3 (PG 94:867).) and Gregory, (Gregory the Great, Morals on the Book of Job, bk. 2, ch. 3 (CCSL 143; PL 75:556).) angels are bodily in comparison to God. Therefore, they are not incorporeal in themselves.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, it is more noble to have life in oneself and confer it on another than not to give life to another even though one has life in oneself. But the life of an angel is more noble than that of the soul. Therefore, it seems that even more than the soul it should have a body united to it, to which it might give life.

On the contrary, Dionysius says (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4 (PG 3:867).) that the angels are understood as incorporeal and immaterial.

Furthermore, every substance naturally united to a body that gives life to it has some powers that are perfections of a given part of the body. Therefore, if angels are naturally united to bodies as giving life to them, they must have powers connected to organs, like the sensitive and nutritive powers of the soul. If these were held to exist in angels, then angels would not differ from men.

I answer that neither the good nor the wicked angels have bodies naturally united to them. For this could only be the case if they were forms of these bodies or at least movers proportionate to these bodies, and since they are of a more perfect nature than are souls, they would have to have more noble bodies. But among all generable and corruptible bodies, the human body is the most noble, most closely approaching, as it were, the likeness of a heavenly body on account of its evenness of constitution. Hence their bodies would have to be heavenly bodies. In this case we would be back at the error of the philosophers who posited that the angels are the forms of the spheres and are multiplied after their number. Even this would be more probable by far than that they have bodies of air naturally united to them, which Augustine seems to say—though it is said that he only uses this position as a hypothesis, making use of the positions of the Platonists against whom he was disputing.

Reply Obj. 1: What Apuleius said is false, and Augustine did not dispute the point because he did not want to assert much concerning angels.

Reply Obj. 2: According to Dionysius, (Pseudo-Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 2 (PG 3:143).) animal and human properties are attributed to angels in a more eminent way. For what a lower nature possesses, the higher also possesses, not in the same way, but more eminently. Hence an angel is called an “animal,” not because it is a composite of soul and body, but rather by the fact that it has the power of knowing sensible things, yet not in a sensible way but an intellectual way.

Reply Obj. 3: The angels are called “corporeal” in comparison to God because they have a certain property in common with bodily things, namely, to be bounded by a place, in which bodies differ greatly from God, and not because angels have a bodily nature in any way.

Reply Obj. 4: The more absolutely something has being or life, the more noble it is. Thus, since every form has being in its conjunction to matter, life that is not united to a body is more noble than that which is the form of a body. But what infuses life after the manner of an efficient cause alone, and not as a conjoined form, is even more noble. But this belongs neither to the soul nor to angels, but rather to God alone.

Article 2

Whether the angels assume bodies

To the second we proceed as follows. (Parallel texts: ST I.51.2; On the Power of God, q. 6, a. 7.) It seems that the angels do not assume bodies.

Obj. 1: For every assumption ends in a union. But the angels cannot be united to bodies. Therefore, neither can they assume bodies.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, just as a united spirit is related to separation, so also a separated spirit is related to union. But a united spirit, namely, the soul, cannot be separated at will. Therefore, neither can a separated spirit be joined with a body by assuming it.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, if they assume bodies, this is only for the sake of doing something. For they do not need bodies for their being, either with regard to its beginning or with regard to its end, the way rational souls need bodies with regard to their beginning, since they are created in the body, but not with regard to their end, since they remain after the body. But every power, the more it is separate from the body, the stronger it is in its activities, as is clear in the rational soul. Therefore, it seems that in no way do they assume bodies.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, since the angels cannot be the forms of bodies, as has been said, (Above: a. 1.) they can only be joined to bodies as mover to moved. But they are joined this way with everything they act on. Therefore, if this is what it meant to assume a body, they would assume a body whenever they were around us, which is not said.

Obj. 5: Furthermore, an angel is in whatever body it assumes. But every body, since it is divisible, has more than one part, and what is first and through itself in something is in any given part of it, as is proved in the Physics 6. (Aristotle, Physics 6.3, 233b32–234b8.) For if it were only in one part, it would not be said to be in the whole except by reason of the part. Therefore, since an angel cannot be in more than one place at the same time, as was said in Book I, (In I Sent., d. 37, q. 3, a. 2.) it seems that it cannot assume a body.

On the contrary, that which is incorporeal in itself cannot be seen. But angels have frequently appeared visibly to men, as is read in Sacred Scripture. Since they are incorporeal, as has been said, (Above: d. 3, q. 1, a. 1.) it seems that they assume a body.

I answer that this is the error of some who say that the angels never assume a body, and they say that everything Scripture says about the apparitions of the angels was done as an illusion or an imaginary vision. But because the saints commonly say that the angels have appeared to men even by bodily vision, and the text of Scripture seems to agree with this, we must then undoubtedly say that the angels sometimes assume bodies in which they are seen by men.

One must consider how this happens. For since spiritual nature is higher than bodily nature, bodily nature must obey it. Now, this is not with regard to the reception of forms. For the first beginning of forms in matter, insofar as there are said to be certain aptitudes to form in it, is from the work of the Creator, and they are brought to act through the power of determinate natural agents. But with regard to local motion, which places no form in the thing moved, a body obeys a spiritual power. Insofar as the spiritual power moves a body, it is joined to it as mover to moved. Further, when an angel forms this moved body in the manner described above in order that visible properties befitting its own invisible properties may appear in it, then it is said to assume that body. Hence sometimes they appear in the figure of a man or a lion or things of this sort, through whose properties we are given to understand the angels’ spiritual powers.

Reply Obj. 1: An assumption of this kind ends in a union of the mover to the moved, like the union of a sailor to the ship, not like that of form to matter.

Reply Obj. 2: A joined spirit, namely, the soul, is united to a body as its form in a single being. Thus, it cannot be separated at will, but rather by nature, if the body becomes indisposed. But a separated spirit can be joined through his will to a body, not as its form, but as to an instrument. Hence by the power of its nature it can assume and set aside the body when it wills, just as a man does with his instrument.

Reply Obj. 3: An angel’s power is not impeded by the body assumed. For it is not assumed as matter proportionate to a form, and it does not benefit from the assumption. Rather, it is assumed as an instrument for the consolation of those to whom it appears, so that they can be led by the hand from visible things to the knowledge of invisible things.

Reply Obj. 4: To move a body is not enough to assume it; rather, it must be formed, as has been said.

Reply Obj. 5: An angel who assumes a body is completely in any given part of it, yet it is not in more than one place. For a whole that is moved by one movement is related to the angel as one indivisible place, since it is only in a place through its activity, as was said in Book I. (In I Sent., d. 37, q. 3, a. 1.)

Article 3

Whether the bodies assumed by the angels truly have the nature that they appear to have

To the third we proceed as follows. It seems that angels assume these bodies truly, as having the nature that they seem to have.

Obj. 1: For a fiction does not befit the messengers of truth. But it is a kind of fiction to show forth what is not true. Therefore, it seems that the assumed bodies truly have the nature of these things.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, human properties are only found in a true human body. But according to Dionysius, (Pseudo-Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 15 (PG 3:327).) these sorts of apparitions happen so that from the properties of visible things we may be instructed about invisible things. Therefore, the same thing seems to follow as before.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, the properties of different orders are not the same. But the assumption of bodily figures is for the purpose of making the invisible properties of the angels manifest. Therefore, it seems that the angels of higher orders and those of the lower orders should not appear in the same figure.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, a question arises concerning the matter they assume, and it seems that it is not air. For the body that the angels assume has a determinate shape and is distinct from other bodies. But air can only have a shape by following the figure of another body, due to the fact that since it is exceedingly moist it cannot be bounded by its own edges, but only by those of another. This is also why one part of air is continuous with the next. Therefore, it seems that they do not assume a body of air.

Obj. 5: Again, it seems that neither is it a body of earth. For angels who appear, disappear in an instant. But this cannot happen with a dense body of earth. Therefore they do not assume a body of this sort.

Obj. 6: Furthermore, it is well known that there is an intermediate fire between us and heaven, which acts intensely on lower bodies. So if they assumed a body of the lower elements, it seems that when they ascend into the heavens then their bodies would be burned up.

Obj. 7: Furthermore, Dionysius says (Pseudo-Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 15 (PG 3:327).) that among other bodies fire best represents the properties of spiritual substances. But angels assume bodies so that we might know these properties, as has been said. (Above: a. 2.) Therefore, it seems that they always assume a body of fire.

Obj. 8: Furthermore, a heavenly body is the most noble of bodies. But a noble moved is due to a noble mover. Therefore, it seems that the body they assume as moved has the nature of the fifth essence. (The “fifth essence” refers to the uncomposed or elementary matter of the heavenly bodies, sometimes called “aether.” The other four “essences” are the traditional four elements (earth, air, fire, and water). The sun, stars, planets, and the entirety of the space surrounding them were hypothesized to be composed of a different sort of matter, because the apparent eternity of their motions suggested that they were incorruptible. See Aristotle, On the Heavens 1.2–3.)

I answer that we can ask what the bodies assumed by angels are like in two ways: either as regards the truth of the nature it possesses, or as regards the matter from which the body is taken. With regard to the first, we must say that the body assumed by an angel does not possess the truth of the nature it has in appearance. Hence, even though a good or wicked angel sometimes moves the body of a true animal, it is not properly said to assume it. For example, an angel is not said to have assumed the tongue of the ass through which it spoke to Balaam, nor is a demon said to assume the body of a man whom it vexes. The reason for this is that the properties that are truly in a body lead to the knowledge of their subject’s principles and not actually to the knowledge of the spiritual substance. But this leading is the whole purpose of shaping visible bodies, according to Dionysius. So as regards the goal of the apparition, the properties must exist in likeness only, lest it be supposed that there is some other thing besides an angel beneath them, where the body would seem to belong to the angel and its properties to be the properties of the angel itself.

Now, if we inquire about the second point, namely, what the body is like as regards its matter, we must say that the matter of the body assumed by an angel can be considered in two ways: either with regard to the beginning of the assumption or with regard to its end. If we consider it with regard to its beginning, then I say that, as is said in the text, (Sent. II, 8.1(43).1.) it takes a body from air because air is the most transmutable and is able to be converted into anything. A sign of this is that some, seeing a body assumed by a demon and attempting to cut it or pierce it with a sword, have not been able to do so, because the parts of air that are divided close back up immediately. But because they can take on such a figure, as befits the angel who appears, as regards the end of the assumption this air must be condensed in some way and approximate the property of earth, though preserving the true nature of air. They can effect this both through local motion by gathering the parts together, and through the seeds scattered among the elements, as has been said before. (Above: d. 7, exposition of the text.)

Reply Obj. 1: Falsity is not implied by the fact that metaphorical expressions are not spoken to signify the things for which the names were originally coined, but rather things that have a likeness to the things said. Similarly, there is no fiction in the angels’ apparitions, since those figures are not manifested to signify the natural being of that thing, but rather the properties of the angel.

Reply Obj. 2: Even though the true properties of man are only in bodily nature, there can still be likenesses of those properties in other things. Such likenesses suffice for the goal of the apparition.

Reply Obj. 3: According to Dionysius, (Pseudo-Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 15 (PG 3:327).) a higher and a lower angel are sometimes manifested in the same figure. For a single thing has different properties, through some of which it can represent the higher and through others the lower. Furthermore, the higher and the lower also have properties that are the same, though they have them in different ways, according to Dionysius.

Reply Obj. 4: Air that is condensed in some way can be given a shape and distinguished from the other air.

Reply Obj. 5: In a way it is of earth, inasmuch as it has the property of earth by being condensed. But this density is dissolved at once when the causes of the density depart.

Reply Obj. 6: Since they only assume bodies for our sake, it is not probable that they bear the assumed bodies to the empyrean heaven or make use of them except insofar as necessary to carry out activities that concern us.

Reply Obj. 7: The properties of fire, especially with regard to brightness, appear in the bodies assumed by the good angels, just as do the properties of man. But this does not necessitate that they materially assume this sort of body from fire.

Reply Obj. 8: Since the body of the heavens is incorruptible, it cannot be divided, except in the imagination, and it does not receive foreign impressions. Hence it cannot be formed into an angel’s body.

Article 4

Whether the angels can eat, generate, sense, be moved, or speak in their assumed bodies

Quaestiuncula 1

To the fourth we proceed as follows. (Parallel texts: ST I.51.3; On the Power of God, q. 6, a. 8.) It seems that the angels in their assumed bodies are able to eat.

Obj. 1: For we read (Gen 18:5) that Abraham offered food to the angels who appeared to him. But he knew that they were angels, as his conversation with them shows. Therefore, it seems that they can eat.

On the contrary, the most express argument for the Resurrection of the Lord is that the risen Christ himself ate. Hence it is said: God . . . made him manifest, not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him (Acts 10:40–41). But an act that can befit a spirit is not an argument for a bodily resurrection. Therefore, the angels who assume bodies do not truly eat.

Quaestiuncula 2

Again, it seems that they can generate.

Obj. 1: For it is said: the sons of God, seeing that the daughters of men were fair, took to themselves wives of all which they chose (Gen 6:2). Josephus explains this as referring to incubus demons. (Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, bk. 1, ch. 4.) Therefore, it seems that they can generate.

On the contrary (2), generation is accomplished through the formative power that is in the seed when separated from the living body. But the body assumed by demons and angels is not living, as has been said. (Above: a. 1.) Therefore, it seems that they cannot generate.

Furthermore (3), it might be said that they generate because the same demon can act as succubus to a man and receive from him what it then transfers to a woman, having become an incubus to her.

On the contrary, seed possesses the power to generate only as long as the warmth of the soul is retained in it, which must dissipate when the seed is borne over a great distance. Therefore, it seems that generation cannot be accomplished in this manner.

Furthermore (4), if such generation were possible in this manner, it would only be from the power of the seed itself. Therefore, from this it would not follow that the offspring would possess any greater power than other men, as is implied from what follows: these were the mighty men of old, men of renown (Gen 6:4).

Quaestiuncula 3

Again, it seems that they can sense.

Obj. 1: For they assume bodies having different sense organs. But this would be pointless if they could not see through their eyes and hear through their ears. Therefore, and so on.

On the contrary, to sense with bodily organs is to receive knowledge from things, which does not befit angels, as has been said. (Above: d. 3, q. 3, a. 3.) Therefore, and so on.

Quaestiuncula 4

Again, it seems that they can be moved locally.

Obj. 1: This seems so based on what we read in Tobit, chapter 6 and following, about the angel who accompanied Tobias through many areas on earth.

On the contrary, what is joined to something only as its mover, if it is immovable in itself, it is not moved on the basis of that thing’s motion, as is clear in the movers of the spheres, according to the philosophers. But an angel in and of itself is an immovable spiritual substance. Therefore, it seems that on the basis of the motion of a body to which it is only joined as mover, it itself is not moved.

Quaestiuncula 5

Again, it seems that they speak.

Obj. 1: based on the many passages of Scripture that often relate that they have spoken to men.

On the contrary, in every act of speaking certain intellectual concepts are expressed. But these kinds of concepts can only reach the voice from the intellect by the mediation of something proportionate to receiving such things, like the human imagination. Therefore, it seems that they cannot speak through an assumed inanimate body or through the body of a brute animal.

Response to Quaestiuncula 1

I answer that, as has been said before, (Above: a. 1.) the angels do not infuse life into their assumed bodies, but only motion. Thus, we must consider that all the activities that follow on a living body precisely as living cannot belong to angels in assumed bodies, but only those that follow on a movable body as movable, such as moving, impelling, dividing, and things of this sort.

Reply Obj. 1: The complete account of “eating” includes not only dividing food and putting it into one’s mouth, but also that this act proceeds from a power able to digest it and convert it into nourishment. Thus, the angels did not truly eat. But there was in that case a true division of food and putting it into the assumed body, though it was not afterwards converted into that body, but was instead dissolved into underlying matter by the angel’s power. However, Christ truly ate, even though the food was not converted, since this biting off of food belonged to one possessing nutritive and convertive power. And it is not unfitting in the case of Abraham that, even if he knew they were angels in the end, this was hidden to him at the beginning, or that, if he did know, he offered them food to call to mind some mystery.

Response to Quaestiuncula 2

I answer that some say that demons can in no way generate in assumed bodies, and that sons of God does not signify incubus angels, but rather the sons of Seth, and that daughters of men signifies the women who were descended from the line of Cain. But since the contrary is asserted by many, and what seems so to many cannot be altogether false, according to the Philosopher, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 7.13, 1153b27; On Divination in Sleep 1, 462b15.) it can then be said that their act accomplishes generation inasmuch as they can apply human seed in the appropriate place to its proportionate matter, just as they can also collect the seeds of other things to accomplish certain effects, as has been said in the preceding distinction. (Above: d. 7, exposition of the text.) In this way, only local motion is attributed to them, not generation itself, whose principle is not the power of a demon or of the body assumed by it, but rather the power of him whose seed it was. Hence the offspring is the child not of a demon but of a man.

Reply Sed Contra 2: And in this way, the reply to the first objection to the contrary is clear.

Reply Sed Contra 3: Since here demons are moved with exceeding speed on account of the moving power’s dominance over the thing moved, they can arrange things so as to preserve the seed such that its vital warmth does not dissipate.

Reply Sed Contra 4: The demons can know the power of the extracted seed based on the disposition of the man from whom it was extracted, and likewise the woman proportionate to the reception of that seed, as well as any constellation assisting the bodily effect, namely, that which helps the offspring to be put together in an optimal way. When all these factors come together, it is possible for the offspring to be larger or stronger in body.

Response to Quaestiuncula 3

I answer that angels in no way see through the eyes of the assumed body, since this is an activity of the power of a living body. Hence the parts of the assumed body are not sense organs, but rather possess a likeness to them in order to make manifest the angels’ spiritual powers. This is why Dionysius teaches us to reflect on the angelic properties based on all the parts of the human body. (Pseudo-Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 15 (PG 3:330).) So they are not assumed in vain.

Response to Quaestiuncula 4

I answer that they are moved incidentally via the motions of the bodies in which they are present. For they are in those bodies definitively, in such a manner that they are not elsewhere. Now, God is not moved on the basis of the motion of a body, because just as he is in one so also he is in another, just as the soul is not moved incidentally on the basis of the motion of a hand, but rather on the basis of the motion of the whole body. Similarly, according to the philosophers, the mover of a sphere is joined to the sphere in its entirety and not one part alone, even though its power first appears on the right side, where the motion begins. Thus, it does not move incidentally, since the whole sphere does not move out of its place, but such that it is in some place in account, and not in subject.

Response to Quaestiuncula 5

I answer that, in the strict sense, speaking occurs through the formation of words by the percussion of air that is breathed with determined organs in order to express a thought. Thus, angels cannot have bodily speech in the full sense of the term, since they do not have true bodily organs. But they do something like speaking inasmuch as they understand and express an understanding with certain sounds, which are not properly vocal sounds but rather the likenesses of vocal sounds, just as certain animals that do not breathe are said to have a voice, and are as certain instruments, as the Philosopher says. (Aristotle, On the Soul 2.8, 420b5–9.) But the concepts understood by an angel do not come to be present in those sounds the same numerically, but rather according to a likeness of signification through motions determined by the intellect, just as the likeness of art is produced in matter, such as a house.

Article 5

Whether the demons can be within the bodies of men

To the fifth we proceed as follows. It seems that demons cannot be within the bodies of men.

Obj. 1: For the Gloss on the passage, the Lord is in his holy temple (Hab 2:20), says that the demons can be present outside of idols, but not present within them. (Glossa interlinearis, at Habakkuk 2:20 (in Glossa ordinaria 4.2025–26); Jerome, Commentary on Habakkuk, at Habakkuk 2:20 (PL 25:1055).) Therefore, much less can they be present within human bodies.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, two created spirits cannot be in the same place, as was said in Book I. (In I Sent., d. 37, q. 3, a. 3.) But the soul is present in any given part of the body. Therefore, it seems that a demon cannot be present in any part of it.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, according to Damascene, (John Damascene, On the Orthodox Faith, bk. 2, ch. 3 (PG 94:870).) an angel is present where it is at work. But just as it works on the body, so also it has an activity concerning the soul. Therefore, just as it is not within the soul, neither is it within the body.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, it seems that they cannot make an impression on bodily senses by deluding them with illusions. For a form that is seen must be somewhere. But it cannot be only in the senses, because the senses have no species but what they receive from things. Nor again can it be in the thing seen, such that a woman might seem to be a horse, because two substantial forms cannot be in the same thing. Besides, the thing would be seen as such by all. Nor again can it be in the surrounding air, for the air is not susceptible to shape, and one and the same air does not always stay around the thing, especially when the thing moves. Therefore, it seems that the demons cannot play tricks of this sort.

On the contrary (5), it seems that they can find their way even into the soul. For no one can know what is in the heart unless he penetrates the innermost depths of the heart. But the demons know the evil thoughts of sinners, of which they accuse them before God, and from which they take occasion to tempt them. Therefore, it seems that they enter into the soul.

Furthermore (6), they send evil thoughts, as is said in the Psalms: fierce anger, wrath, indignation, and distress, a company of destroying angels (Ps 78:49 [77:49]). Therefore, it seems that they can penetrate the intellect.

Furthermore (7), they are also called the “inflamers of evil men.” But to be inflamed is an affect pertaining to love. Therefore, it seems that they can even make an impression on our will and enter it.

I answer that the good and wicked angels, by the power of their nature, have the power to transmute our bodies just as they do other natural bodies. Since they are present where they are at work, they enter our bodies and consequently even make an impression on powers connected with organs whose activities are changed on the basis of the organs’ being changed, such as the senses, the imagination, and things of this sort. In this way, their activity incidentally has a result in the intellect, whose object is the fantasy, (Phantasia is the Greek word often translated by the Latin imaginatio (“imagination”).) as color is the object of sight, as is said in On the Soul 3. (Aristotle, On the Soul 3.7, 431a15–20.) Nevertheless, they do not reach all the way to the will. For the will, whether with regard to act or with regard to object, does not depend on a bodily organ, since it receives its object from the intellect insofar as the intellect apprehends something under the aspect of good.

Reply Obj. 1: A demon is said to be not present within an idol as a power joined to it in such a way that from the demon and the idol there would arise a single thing, as idolaters thought there was a divine power in bodily images.

Reply Obj. 2: The soul is not in the body as in a place, but rather as a form is in matter. Thus, the activity that the soul effects in the body and that of a demon do not have the same account. Consequently, both can be in the same part of the body at the same time without any confusion of activities.

Reply Obj. 3: To be within something is to be within its bounds. Now, the body has bounds in two ways, namely, boundaries of quantity and boundaries of essence. Thus, an angel at work within the bounds of the body’s quantity enters into the body, though not in such a way that it is within the bounds of its essence, either as a part or as a power that gives being. For being comes through creation by God. However, a spiritual substance does not have bounds of quantity, but only those of essence. Thus, no one enters into it except him alone who gives being, God the Creator, who has an activity intrinsic to the essence, whereas other perfections are added over and above the essence. Hence an angel that illuminates is not said to be in another angel or in the soul, but rather is spoken of as working something from without.

Reply Obj. 4: The forms that are seen in these illusions are only in the senses. Now, demonic activity can cause this in two ways. One way is such that species that are kept in the imagination by the activity of demons would flow into the sense organs, as occurs in sleep. Thus, when those species come into contact with the organs of the external senses, they seem as if they were things externally present and are actually being sensed. The other way can be based on the changing of the organs that, when they are changed, cause the senses to be deceived in their judgment, as in the case of someone who has a corrupt sense of taste, and so to him everything seems bitter. But they can do this by the power of natural things, just as the floorboards of a house look like snakes when some vapor rises. And experiences of this sort are common.

Reply Sed Contra 5: To know the thoughts of hearts belongs to God alone. Even so, angels can deduce some of them from external bodily signs, such as a change of facial expression, as it is said: the secret will of a man can be read on his face. So too it can be deduced from the motion of the heart, as a doctor knows the soul’s passions by the way the heart pulses.

Reply Sed Contra 6: The wicked angels introduce thoughts, as was said before, (Above: d. 7, q. 2, a. 2, resp.) by illuminating phantasms so that on the basis of their different combinations new concepts can be received from them. Even so, the intellect is not compelled to accept them, since besides its object and knowing power, actual knowledge requires that the one knowing possess an image, either through the senses or through the intellect. But the good angels can also directly make an impression on the intellect. For, according to Augustine, (See Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos, Psalm 118:73, sermon 18, para. 4 (CCSL 40; PL 37:1553); see also City of God, bk. 10, ch. 16, para. 1 (CCSL 47; PL 41:294); bk. 21, cc. 3–8 (CCSL 48; PL 41:710–23).) they work on our intelligences in wondrous ways. Now this is so inasmuch as their intellectual light strengthens the light of our agent intellect. But demons do not have this effect. For even though their natural light is more efficacious than the light of our intellect, they are not perfected by the light of grace, but instead shadowed by the darkness of fault. And so they do not intend to improve the judgment of our reason by strengthening our intellectual light, but rather to show us things by which we are deceived, which they do by illuminating phantasms.

Reply Sed Contra 7: Demons are called “inflamers” inasmuch as they heat up the blood and so dispose the soul to concupiscent desire, as certain foods provoke lust. But to make an impression on the will belongs to God alone. This is because of the freedom of the will, which is master of its own act and is not compelled by the object as the intellect is compelled by demonstration. Hence it is clear from what has been said that the demons make an impression on the fantasy, the angels on the intellect also, but God alone on the will.

Article 6

Whether God has appeared in bodily figures

To the sixth we proceed as follows. It seems that God himself has not appeared in bodily figures.

Obj. 1: For the apparitions of this sort, made to the fathers among the prophets, were accomplished through the mediation of angels, by whose ministry the law also was handed down, as it is said (Acts 7:30, 38, and Heb 2:2). But the one who immediately makes the revelation is the one who appears. Therefore, it seems that God did not appear in bodily forms of this sort.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, an angel who appears visibly assumes a body in which it is seen. But God has never assumed a body, except into the unity of person. Therefore, it seems that he is not seen in bodily figures.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, an angel who appears in a body is present in that in which it had not been present before. But in those created things in which God is said to appear, he is only present as he had been before—that is, by his essence, presence, and power. Therefore, it seems that he did not appear.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, if God did appear, then it seems that a visible mission would have taken place in the Old Testament just as in the New. But this is denied by the saints.

On the contrary, in Exodus, where the Lord is speaking to his people, it is said, you shall have no other gods before me (Exod 20:3). And frequently we also find: I, the Lord. Therefore, it seems that God himself appeared.

Furthermore, it says in Isaiah: I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up (Isa 6:1), which belongs to no one but God himself. Therefore, it seems that he saw God himself.

I answer that God can never be seen in his essence by bodily eyes or even by the intellect, except by the blessed. But he has appeared to men in bodily forms. Now, this apparition took place by the ministry of angels, as Augustine says in On the Trinity, (Augustine, On the Trinity, bk. 3, ch. 11 (CCSL 60; PL 42:881–86).) since divine illuminations only come to us by the mediation of the celestial hierarchy, as Dionysius says. (Pseudo-Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 4 (PG 3:178).) Hence in all these bodily apparitions, the body is formed, assumed, and moved by an angel.

Even so, sometimes an angel is said to appear in the body assumed through the angel, and sometimes God is said to appear. For the formation and apparition of an assumed body, as has been said, (Above: a. 3.) is done in order to make manifest the properties of spiritual substances. So sometimes an angel, who immediately illuminates a man, wishes to instruct him about a proper power that this angel itself has, and then it expresses the likenesses of its power in the body, and so the lower angel itself is said to appear. But sometimes it wishes to instruct a man about the divine power or that of a higher angel through whom it works. Then it forms the assumed body to express the eminence of the divine majesty or the properties of a higher angel, and then God or the higher angel is said to appear. Gregory also says this in his gloss on Exodus 3, (Gregory the Great, Morals on the Book of Job, pref. (CCSL 143; PL 75:517).) giving a reason why the angel who spoke to Moses is sometimes called an “angel” and sometimes called “the Lord.”

Reply Obj. 1: In this way, the reply to the first objection is clear. For the angel who immediately forms the body is not said to appear, but rather God, whose properties are signified in the figure of the body displayed.

Reply Obj. 2: The response to the second objection is similar. For even though an angel forms or moves a body, it itself is not said to appear for the reason already mentioned, but rather God.

Reply Obj. 3: God was in those creatures in a new way, just as the thing signified is present in the sign.

Reply Obj. 4: The visible sending of a divine person differs from an apparition. This difference was explained in Book I. (In I Sent., d. 16, q. 1, a. 1.)

Exposition of the text

‘Water and earth tend to be passive; air and fire tend to be active.’ (Sent. II, 8.1(43).2, quoting Augustine, On the Literal Interpretation of Genesis, bk. 3, ch. 10 (CSEL 28.1:72; PL 34:284–85).) This seems to be false, since in water the active quality, namely, cold, dominates. Thus, it seems to be more active than air in which the passive quality dominates, namely, moist.

We must say that this objection comes from a consideration of action and passion with reference to active and passive qualities. But the case is otherwise if we consider them with reference to the substantial forms that are the first principles of action. For the more subtle something is, the more active it is, since it partakes more of form. And what is denser is more passive, since it partakes more of matter.

But in asserting that God appeared to men in bodily likenesses, he poses a perplexing question. (Sent. II, 8.2(44).2.) Here a question is raised which has three parts corresponding to the three ways in which a divine apparition can be reckoned. One way is that a new creature is created so that God can appear in it, and this is true if by “creation” we understand the formation of a body made through the ministry of angels. The second way is that the angels variously transform the bodies naturally united to them to express various likenesses. The third way is that, beyond the bodies they have, they assume other denser bodies like garments in which they may be seen. Both of these latter ways are false, since they suppose that angels have bodies naturally united to them.

‘For there is nothing visible which is not changeable.’ (Sent. II, 8.3(45), quoting Augustine, On the Trinity, bk. 3, ch. 10 (CCSL 50; PL 42:881).) This is true absolutely if understood as referring to external sight. For every visible thing is a natural body, and every natural body is movable either locally or in another way.

‘We do not believe that demons insinuate themselves substantially into the soul by energy (operation).’ (Sent. II, 8.4(46).2, quoting Gennadius of Marseilles, Book of Ecclesiastical Dogmas, ch. 83.) “Energy” takes its name from en, meaning “in,” ergia, meaning “work,” and geos, meaning “earth.” (The first two parts of this etymology are correct, but there is no connection to the word for “earth” in the Greek word energeia.) It corresponds to those who suffer inwardly from an earthy and melancholic humor. For such people are deprived of the use of reason. Thus, those who are inwardly possessed by a demon are also called “energumens.”