Освещение в Эпистемологии Бонавентура
Illumination in Bonaventure’s Epistemology
By Alexander Koudlai
I
The
telos of this essay is to support the axiology of the literary work of the
great man, which impressed me who lives almost eight hundred years later. What
makes it so important to me and may be to our contemporary culture? The
epistemology and metaphysics are considered there together and in such a way
that the ethics of human life is affected in a reasonably defensible manner. Probably
our contemporary axiology (and particularly in the matters of acquiring and
evaluating of knowledge) may benefit from the investigation of Bonaventure’s
theory.
Today we are
used to hear that a theory has to be verifiable in order to be
considered as knowledge. By verifiable it is usually meant empirically
provable. The latter means observable to senses and capable of
repeated observations. The theories of ancient and medieval thinkers are
usually treated lightly and accused of dogmatism, i.e. of claims not
supported by experience. Nevertheless, it is not accurate because the spiritual
and miraculous experiences reported by many individuals from different
countries in every century and the communities of monks and nuns living in the
monasteries (those laboratories of spiritual life) do support those theories
again and again. Our W. James wrote of those prejudices of the scientific
community of his time and of their refusal even to consider those “hard cases”
not easily explicable by the contemporary scientific theories. There is still a
huge problem in this department today, and we just have to be aware about its
existence. As James, claiming himself to be a radical empiricist, suggested, if
a theory (and he meant a modern theory) cannot deal with some facts
reported by honest people, it is too bad for the theory and not for the facts.
This sounds at least consistent and fair.
When
observation is artificially limited only to the observation by physical senses,
the observer risks to lock himself into a dogmatic circle, especially when he
judges about non-empirical claims, or claims of the human observations which
transcend merely sensual ones*. Those people who do this usually claim
themselves materialists and are opposed to theories of spiritual thinkers. As
we can see, the empiricists are not all materialists, who are extremely
dogmatic themselves, but even though their theories are based on axioms which
are not always shared by the rest of humanity and may seem dogmatic in certain
respects to those who prefer to think differently. Another objection to
theories of spiritual thinkers was that “they all disagree”, hence the truth,
the existence of which they claim, could not be the universal truth.
In my opinion,
the ontological claims of different prominent thinkers from different
traditions have more points in common then not and others are arguably
convertible. Those thinkers from different times and cultures universally claim
the existence of truth beyond sensual experiences and somehow human access to that
truth. They also say that some people persist in some kind of blindness to the
truth and teachings of it. This blindness does not exclude productive thinking
in the empirical mode, but it does secure the dissatisfaction of the soul and
many kinds of suffering.
________________________________________________________
*Professor
D. Robinson said once: “A scientist taking a corpuscular approach to
explanation of the world, usually sets parameters for observations of
corpuscles, build instruments capable to pick corpuscles, observes what those
instruments show him and then says: I claimed that the world was corpuscular and
see: it is corpuscular …” (The Great Ideas of Philosophy)
Jesus says:
But because
I tell the truth, you do not believe Me. . . . And if I tell the truth, why
do you not believe Me? He who is of God hears God’s words; therefore you
do not hear, because you are not of God”. (John 8:45-47)
In the Lankavatara Sutra Buddha
says:
Then there are materialistic philosophers. No
respect nor service is to be shown them because their teachings though
they may be explained by using hundreds of thousands of words and phrases, do
not go beyond the concepts of this world and this body and in the end
they lead to suffering. As the materialists recognize no truth as existing by
itself...(D. Goddard “A Buddhist Bible”, p.312-313).
Bonaventure
respects the empirical knowledge. He read Aristotle’s Physics and Metaphysics,
but he also read Neo-Platonists and was impressed by Plato’s theory of
archetypes, which we cannot say where he received from*. Bonaventure is a friar
and a mystic, and the existence of the spiritual light, bliss and the visions
beyond physical senses is an immediate reality for him; also he is a scholar.
Therefore, he attempts to synthesize different theoretical views into one
consistent theory, which would account for the empirical, speculative and
spiritual knowledge, and would be consistent with the Revelation of the Holy
Scripture and Bonaventure’s favorite thinker St. Augustine, “the wisest of them
all”.
II
How
do we know? Plato used to say that there is knowledge and beliefs or opinions,
and there are lovers of knowledge, or wisdom philosophers, and lovers of
opinions philodoxers. The beliefs (opinions) could be beautiful but not
true, while
____________________________________
* Possibly
Plotinus, Porphyry, Augustine or some medieval writers before Bonaventure.
knowledge is
always true. While certain beliefs when tested could collapse, the truth is
resilient to any tests whether empirical or speculative (logical). Of course,
Bonaventure is a believer, but he also thinks that he can show for something
more then just a belief. For Bonaventure the question: “How do we know that
something is true with certitude?” - is important. He thinks about this kind
of knowledge of anything as of illumined by light.
When the intellect knows
something with certainty, it is because it is enlightened from above. He writes
in his On the Reduction of Arts to Theology:
Every good
gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the God of Lights,
writes James . . . of the source of all illumination; but at the same time. .
. there are many lights which flow generously from that fontal source of light.
Then pointing
out the essentially internal nature of illumination of all knowledge he
categorizes the varieties of such illumination:
Even though
every illumination of knowledge is internal, still we can reasonably
distinguish what can be called an exterior light of mechanical art; an inferior
light, or the light of sense perception; an interior light of
philosophical knowledge; and a superior light or the light of grace and
of Sacred Scripture. The first light illumines with respect to the forms of artifacts;
the second with respect to natural forms; the third, with respect to intellectual
truth; the forth and last with respect to saving truth. (p.37)
In other words, God
of Lights gives knowledge to His creatures and directly inspires
different kinds of pursuits of knowledge (arts) according to different aspects
of that part of human nature, which is currently under investigation, and this
is always for the sake of that creature.
The
creature is always enlightened directly from the Creator but in different
applications of that One Light and normally follows the lead acquiring various
kinds of useful knowledge co-operating in that intended enlightenment in all
different spheres of its life. This theory truly reduces all kinds of knowledge
to theology but in a meaningful and consistent way.
Whatever
is our knowledge we can always associate it with light, because we observe
it empirically or intellectually. Even perfect spiritual knowledge is called beatific
vision. Observing we see by light in all cases, that is why it is
proper to relate all our knowledge to light. This approach is universal, and
may be even more universal than some Bonaventurians would like to admit. In one
of the ancient Upanishads of India it is described in the form of a
dialog between a teacher and a student:
How do you see
at the daytime?
- I see by the
light of the sun.
And when it is
night?
- By the light
of the moon.
And when there
is no moon?
- Then by the
light of a candle.
And when there
is no sun, moon or candle?
- Then,
teacher, I somehow see by the light within.
In the Disputed
Questions on the Knowledge of Christ (q. 4, p. 115-117) Bonaventure quotes from
St. Augustine On the Teacher:
In every
instance where we understand something, we are listening not to someone who
utters external words, but to that truth which guides us from the
mind itself (1).
The City of
God:
Those whom we
rightly prefer to all others have said that the very God by whom all things
were made is the light of our minds by which we learn all things
(4).
On the
Trinity:
When our soul
so pleases us that we prefer it to all corporeal light, it is not the soul
itself that pleases us but that art by which it was created. For a created
thing is worthy of approval in reference to that source where it is seen to
have been present before it was created. Now this is the truth and pure
goodness(5)
When we
approve or disapprove of something rightly, we are shown to approve or
disapprove by virtue of other rules which remain altogether unchangeable
and above our mind (6).
This light,
which is the truth and goodness, come from within and there from above. The
latter is obvious to Bonaventure, because - he quotes (8):
When the
unjust person sees the rules according to which everyone ought to live, where
does he see them? Not in his own nature, since it is certain his mind is
changeable while these rules are unchangeable. And not in any habit of his
mind, since these are rules of justice. Where does he perceive that he ought to
possess something that he does not possess? Where then are they written but in
the book of that light which is called the truth, from which every just law is
copied? (Augustine, On the Trinity, chapter 15)
Further in the
argument 8 Bonaventure presents the Augustinian correction of Plato’s theory of
reminiscence:
It is credible
that even those who are unskilled in certain disciplines can give the correct
answers when they are able to receive the eternal light of reason in which they
perceive these immutable truths. This is true, but not because they once knew
them and have forgotten them, as it seemed to Plato. (Retractations)
About this, I
would argue that it is problematic that Plato speaking of the mind and the
eternal ideas did not understand that the mind should ascend from its regular
state. On the contrary, Plato speaks about this divine perfection, which is not
easily achieved by a philosopher while his soul goes through four stages
(symbolically “requires four incarnations”) in his quest for perfect knowledge.
So, the Divine Plato rather had quite similar approach (but of course he
did not use the terminology of the Christian theology), and his reminiscence
does include the possibility that the soul on some deepest level is divine or
participates in the knowledge of the Divinity. It is just that in its regular
state of forgetfulness of its deepest nature it can have just glimpses of the
light that is not essentially external to the soul itself. This seem to be in
compliance with Genesis 2:7 and the idea that we are all children of One
Father, and not bastards.
Bonaventure
continues to quote:
The
intellectual nature is linked not only to intelligible things but also to
immutable things. This nature is made in such a way that when it moves to those
things with which it is connected, or when it moves to itself, it may give
correct answers about such things as it is capable of seeing.
Then he concludes:
From these
authoritative arguments of Augustine it is manifestly clear that everything
is known in the eternal reasons.
The essential
connection of the intellect to the eternal reasons and its capability of seeing
those suggest our relation to those and to the light itself. Bonaventure
quotes from Anselm Proslogion, chapter 14:
How great is
the light from which shines forth all truth that manifests itself to the
rational mind (12) How rich is that truth in which is found everything that is
true and outside of which is only emptiness and falsehood!
And he
concludes: “Therefore no truth is seen except in the eternal truth”. It is not
that dogmatic as it may seem to those contemporary thinkers who claim: “There
is no Truth…” Logically, their claim is a universal claim itself, hence
aspires to be true universally, hence, it claims itself the existence of
the universal truth it attempted to deny, hence does not have any
ontological value and constitutes rather invalid critique on purely emotional
ground.
Quoting
Aristotle’s Ethics:
We all suppose
that what we know by means of science cannot possibly be other than it is. But,
when those things that could be other than they are pass beyond the range of
our observation, we do not know whether they exist or not. Therefore, the
object of scientific knowledge is necessarily eternal. And eternal
things are ungenerated and incorruptible (16).
Bonaventure concludes:
Therefore,
there can be no such thing as certain knowledge unless the very nature of
eternal truth is involved. But this is found only in the eternal reasons.
It
is fascinating, how in the world of contingency, where everything what we
observe could be otherwise, there could be any certainty. Still we know there
is certainty. Where does it come from then? Obviously not from the world of
change and uncertainty. And what is this world? It is the world of the eternal
reasons, which belong to the very nature of God who is beyond all change and
doubt, and who illumines our minds, which are rather attached to this world of
change and are used to its various forms of entertainment.
It
is very reasonable, that when the intellect is connected to senses, analyzing
their data, so to speak, it is habitually in the mode of perception of
precisely this kind of data, but when it is disconnected from senses it may be
in some other mode of perception, and not only of the sensual memory content,
but also what they call super sensual. Isn’t it the reason why the monks or
hermits everywhere practice asceticism? So, usually one mode of perception and
corresponding activity of the intellect excludes or hinders the other mode of
perception and formation of the relevant ideas.
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