Refutation of Certain Doctrines of Aristotle preface–6

… of the [offerings made] by men for the [service] of God, nothing is so acceptable to God as to strive, as far as one is able, to make men better. Since this zeal, then, is very ardent in you, most honored presbyter Paul, [I have been] ready to make a selection of the Greek doctrines about God and creation: not that you may learn anything true from them (for how could you, who have from above the teaching about these things through the prophets, from God himself who made creation?), but that you may know that the Greeks have not done this according to demonstrative science, by which they profess to make their arguments about God and creation, but have defined what seemed good to them by conjecture. Of the men who have made arguments about God and creation, some received the teaching about God and creation from God himself, who made creation, through the prophets who served God for this; whom he first showed to be worthy of belief by the divine works done through them, and then in this way provided the teaching of things unclear to those taught. Others, disbelieving the words spoken through the prophets, entrusted the discovery of the knowledge of God to their own reasonings. According to those who have learned by teaching the difference between God and creation, God is one, being unoriginated in both senses of being unoriginated, having had neither God nor gods before him nor after him, having nothing co-eternal with him, neither underlying nor opposed, having an incorruptible essence and an unhindered activity, being the maker of the whole world, whose beginning of being, of being what it is, and of how it continues is his will. For the parts of the world continue either in incorruption, like the heaven and the heavenly bodies and the invisible powers, or in coming to be and passing away, like the animals and plants on earth. And as what came to be would not have come to be had he not commanded, “Let it be,” so neither would it have continued had he not laid down the command: for the incorruptible things, to stand for ever and ever; for those in generation and corruption, “Increase and multiply and fill the earth.” And to show his divine power, and that he is not a slave to a law of nature but works what he pleases by the authority of his will, at the beginning he made the things of the nature subject to generation and corruption from the earth and the waters, commanding: “Let the earth bring forth the living creature according to its kind, and plants having their seed in themselves, and trees bearing fruit”; and again: “Let the waters bring forth the living creature according to its kind”; but he determined that those born of the first parents should come to be by the casting of seed. And about these things all the prophets sent from God to all men continued to think the same, and there was no disagreement among them. But among those who disbelieved the words of the prophets and defined what seemed good about God and creation by their own conjecture, there is much disagreement, both with one another and with themselves, about the things that exist and their principle, in respect of essence, number, motion, and end; as is shown from the first book of Aristotle's Physics, together with the fact that he says nothing true about the matters he undertook to define.

From the first book of Aristotle's Physics: “For there is always something that underlies, from which what comes to be comes to be, as plants and animals from seed. Things that come to be without qualification come to be some by change of shape, as a statue; some by addition, as things that grow; some by subtraction, as the Hermes from the stone; some by composition, as a house; some by alteration, as things that change in respect of their matter. It is clear that all things that come to be in this way come to be from underlying things. And this is twofold: either the underlying or the opposite. I mean that the unmusical is opposed and the man underlies.” If the one who sows the seed is first, and what comes to be from seed is later, and both are generated, … then in the generation of what lies before us, which comes to be from seed, the seed underlies; but in the generation of the sower it is impossible for seed to underlie. Therefore animals and plants do not always come to be from seed. Further, if each is a generated animal, both the sower and what comes from seed, and each does not come from the same underlying thing, but the one from seed and the other not from seed, how is it not false that animals always come to be from seed? And the same argument holds for plants. Further, if the principle of what comes to be from seed is the sower, and this is unknown and undefined in the treatise of Aristotle's Physics, why was this treatise written, when the principle of the first animal and plant is unknown? For ignorance of what comes from the principle follows from ignorance of the principle. If the animal that comes from seed comes to be according to nature, it is clear that when the same animal comes to be, but not from seed, it does not come to be according to nature. Let the Aristotelians then say according to what the animal comes to be that does not come to be according to nature. Further, if, once a difference is granted in the generation of animals, between the one from seed and according to nature, and the one neither from seed nor according to nature, generation must be limited, how then do the Greeks say that animals and plants, which came to be according to nature, are co-eternal with God, when they cannot even be contemporary with the first animal and plant? Further, if everything that comes to be is always composite, how did you distinguish the mode of things that come to be by composition from the other modes of generation by its own difference? For if every generated thing is composite, it must come to be by composition. But if the mode of generation by composition fits every generation, it is superfluously distinguished from the other modes of generation by its own difference. If the things that underlie the generations mentioned are substances, and in them the twofold character of the underlying is seen, that is, the underlying and the opposite, while matter is not a substance, how does the mode of generation of things that come from substances fit the mode of generation of things that do not come from substance? Necessarily, then, either matter is a substance, or the things that come from matter come to be in another mode besides the stated modes of generation. But since in the treatise of the Physics matter is defined not to be a substance, and the mode of generation of the things that come from it is not handed down, how is this treatise not superfluous, when in it what should be clear is left in perplexity? Further, if, as nature and art must make not chance things from chance things but definite things from definite things, so God too must make definite things from definite things, who is it that set this limit for God? That God set this limit for nature and art is evident. But if God is not under the limit, but makes chance things from chance things, not being hindered by the necessity of the limit from making what he wishes, how is he not also freed from the limit of making from underlying things by necessity? …

Of the same Aristotle, from the same book: “The underlying thing is one in number but two in form. For the man and the gold, and in general the matter, is countable; for it is more a ‘this,’ and what comes to be comes from it not accidentally; but the privation and the contrariety are accidental. The form is one, for instance the order, or the music, or any other of the things predicated in this way. Hence in one sense the principles must be said to be two, in another three; in one sense the contraries, as if one were to speak of the musical and the unmusical, or the hot and the cold, or the harmonized and the unharmonized; in another sense not, for it is impossible for contraries to be acted on by one another. This too is solved by the underlying thing being something else; for this is not a contrary. So the principles are, in a way, not more than the contraries, but two, so to speak, in number; nor again wholly two, because their being is different, but three.” If the underlying thing is one in number but two in form, of which one must underlie the other, how is the underlying thing not underlying itself? And if this is impossible, how is it not false that the underlying thing is two in form? Further, if something must always underlie the things that come to be, and this is matter, how is matter not always generated? For it always underlies one of the contraries: either the privation, or the form, which is contrary to the privation; and by the form it becomes well-shaped, by the privation shapeless. How then is matter not a generated substance, since it always has its being in a generated way? Further, if privation is nothing other than the removal of everything that is, and matter has this, how is its very being matter not removed? Further, if, when form is absent from matter, its being a substance, its being a “this,” and its being are absent from it, then matter is nowhere when form is absent from it. Further, if matter is countable, but the contraries that are accidents of it are not countable, how are there three principles, matter and its accidents? If nothing of what is seen in the constitution of the natures that come to be comes from matter, neither quality nor quantity, how do the things that come to be come to be from it of themselves? If it is impossible for something to be and not to be a “this,” how does matter, not being a “this” because of privation, have being? If privation and form are accidents of matter, but matter is not a substance, how do the contraries happen to it? For accidents happen to a substance. If, as order is in things ordered, so form is in matter, how do disordered things have their being a “this” before the order, while matter, not having being before the form, … the analogy of order to form is preserved in matter? If in the composition of things that come to be only two principles are seen, matter and form, but without composition there are three principles, matter, privation, and form, it is clear then that … of what comes to be the principles are not three but two. How then is what comes to be not the principle of the destruction of one principle, if what comes to be would not have come to be had it not perished? If, as the man is acted on by the musical and the unmusical, and the body by cold and hot, and the voice by harmony and disharmony, so matter is acted on by form and privation, let matter be a substance, like the man and the body, or an accident, like the voice, so that the consistency of the analogy may be kept. But if matter is neither substance nor accident, then it is not acted on by the contraries either.

Of the same, from the same book: “How many, then, are the principles of natural things concerned with generation, and in what way, has been said. And it is clear that something must underlie the contraries, and that the contraries are two; but in another way it is not necessary, for one of the contraries suffices to produce the change by its presence and absence. The underlying nature is knowable by analogy. For as bronze is to a statue, or wood to a bed, or matter and the formless to any of the other things that have form, before it takes the form, so this is to substance, to the ‘this,’ and to being. This, then, is one principle, though not one as the ‘this’ is one; one also is the formula; and contrary to this is the privation. Whether the form or the underlying thing is substance is not yet clear.” If form by its presence gives form to matter, and by its absence makes it formless, and the principles are two, form and the formless, and privation too makes these same things by its presence and absence, then the principles will come to be and be destroyed by one another, and are not eternal. For the eternal does not need any presence and absence in order to be. If the change of the principles comes about by the presence and absence of the contraries, it is clear that the change is from their being principles. How then can those remain principles that have lost their being principles? If a principle that has a principle is not a principle, how can matter, which has form as the principle of its being and privation as the principle of its not being, be a principle? To call “nature” what underlies privation, which is neither substance, nor a “this,” nor being — how is that not superfluous? If principles are neither from others nor from one another, but privation is from the absence of form, and form from the absence of privation, how are form and privation not principles from one another? For by their absence they produce one another. If the relation that bronze has to the statue that is to come from it, matter has to substance, to the “this,” and to being, how is it that bronze, unless it is a substance, a “this,” and a being, cannot have a relation to the statue, but matter, being neither substance nor “this” nor being, can have an analogy to bronze? If all things seen in the constitutions of natural things are knowable by sense, how is matter, from which sensible things come, knowable by analogy and not by sense? Or how at all is it possible for sensible things to come to be from what is not sensible? If being one principle is also a “this,” how does matter have being one principle but not have being a “this”? And if being a “this” and not being a “this” is substance, how is matter not being a “this,” yet not a substance? And how can one exclude matter from being one, when he has divided it into two forms, the underlying for what comes to be and the opposite? If it is not yet clear from what has been said whether form or the underlying thing is substance, how did he make a declarative statement about matter, that it is neither substance nor “this” nor being? For he said that the underlying thing is matter. Sometimes [he says] that it is neither substance nor “this” nor being; sometimes that it is unclear whether it is substance; how is this not among the things that … ?

From the same book: “The first who sought the truth and the nature of things by philosophy turned aside, as it were, into another road, pushed off by inexperience, and say that none of the things that exist either comes to be or perishes, because what comes to be must come to be either from what is or from what is not, and from both of these it is impossible: for what is does not come to be (for it already is), and from what is not nothing could come to be (for something must underlie). And so, magnifying the consequence, they say that there are not even many things, but only being itself.” These words too suffice to bear witness to the truth of what we said about the philosophers among the Greeks: that they did not make their arguments about the things that exist according to demonstrative science, but [defined] what seemed good by conjecture …

From the same book: “We say that coming to be from what is or from what is not, or what is not or what is doing or suffering something, or becoming this or that, is in one way no different from a doctor's doing or suffering something, or something's being or coming to be from a doctor. So, since this is said in two or more ways, it is clear that ‘from what is’ and ‘what is’ doing or suffering [are said so too]. The doctor builds a house, then, not as a doctor but as a builder, and becomes white not as a doctor but as dark. But he heals … and becomes a non-doctor as a doctor. Since we most properly say that the doctor does or suffers something, or that something comes to be from a doctor, if he does or suffers these things as a doctor, clearly ‘to come to be from what is not’ also means this: as what is not. This they failed to distinguish and gave up; and through this ignorance they were so far further ignorant as to think that nothing else comes to be or exists, but abolished all coming to be. We ourselves too say that nothing comes to be without qualification from what is not, but that things do come to be from what is not in a certain way, namely accidentally. For from the privation, which in itself is not-being, something comes to be, it not being present in it. This is wondered at, and it seems impossible that something should come to be thus from what is not. Likewise, neither does what is come to be from what is, except accidentally. And this too comes to be in the same way, as if animal were to come to be from animal, and some animal from some animal, as if a dog were to come to be from a horse; for the dog would come to be not only from some animal but also from animal, but not as animal, for that is already present. If anything is to become an animal not accidentally, it will not be from animal; and if something is to become a being, not from being, nor from not-being. For we have said what ‘from what is not’ means: as not-being. Further, we do not abolish that everything either is or is not.” If neither from what is simply, nor … of those who through inexperience and ignorance abolished generation, and of the one who corrected those who erred, how is generation not abolished by the one who corrected them, as it was abolished by those who erred? If it is impossible for anything to come to be accidentally from what is and from what is not, unless the coming to be of what comes to be in itself is conceived beforehand (for example, it is impossible for the doctor to become white unless the dark becomes white, and impossible for the doctor to build unless the builder builds, if the doctor is dark and a builder), how does anything come to be accidentally from what is and from what is not, when nothing comes to be in itself beforehand? If first there is animal, and later animal from animal, and some animal from some animal, and … the seed is potentially animal but not actually animal, while in the generation of animal simply the underlying thing was not seed, how is animal from animal not a coming to be contrary to nature? If before what comes to be came to be the matter existed, but what comes from it did not, what was the matter? For instance, if there was matter of the horse before the horse came to be, if everything seen in the substance of the horse is generated, how was the matter from which the horse came ungenerated? If neither privation nor matter is [something] in itself, and the accidental happens to what is in itself, how is it possible for something to come to be accidentally from privation, neither in itself nor … ? … it is possible for something to come to be from none of them, neither is it possible for something to come to be from them combined; for example, from what is simply nothing can come to be, and likewise from what is not simply, to use Aristotle's words. How then have both become possible, to come to be from what is and to come to be from what is not? If the underlying thing from which what comes to be comes to be must underlie the contraries, then nothing comes to be from privation accidentally when the contraries do not underlie. He who abolishes neither all being nor not-being, but grants that everything is and is not, how can he speak truly when he says that matter is neither substance nor “this” nor being? If what comes to be comes to be not from what is not simply nor from what is simply, but from both, then it comes to be from matter as from what is and from what is not, and as from what is a “this” and is not a “this.” But if this is so, what was said of matter is false, that it is neither substance nor “this” nor being. As matter is formless, so form is matterless. But if matter and its formlessness are two principles, then form and its matterlessness will also be two principles. How then, when the principles are four, were only three posited?

From the same: “For we say that matter and privation are different, and that of these the one, matter, is not-being accidentally, but privation in itself; and that the one is near to substance and in a way substance, the other not at all. But they say that not-being is the great and the small alike, either both together or each separately. So this mode of the triad is wholly different from that one.” If not-being belongs to matter accidentally, clearly, accidentally, matter is neither matter nor principle. For being matter and being a principle belong to what is. And if not-being belongs to matter accidentally, through … the form. Matter, then, will never be [being] in itself, but accidentally always, sometimes not-being and sometimes being. How then is it not absurd to say that what never is in itself is near to substance and in a way substance? If being matter is one thing and being the matter of something is another, and matter is deprived of being the matter of something but not deprived of being matter, then matter will be both being and not-being: being because it is matter, not-being because it is not the matter of something. But if matter is of nothing, then matter is not of formlessness either. But if matter is of formlessness, … sometimes of formlessness, sometimes of form. That formlessness exists is clear from its having been posited as a principle of things that come to be. But if this is so, then matter is never not-being, but, if it is being, it is sometimes formless and sometimes formed, and therefore always generated. If matter can cast off the formlessness co-eternal with it, it can also cast off its co-eternal ungeneratedness. But if not the second, then not the first either. How then does what comes to be come to be from matter, when matter does not cast off its co-eternal formlessness? If, as the mode of the triad according to Aristotle is different from the mode of the triad according to Plato, so the triad too is different … the principle of things that come to be is the hexad, but the triad … ?