On God’s Essence, Energies, & Simplicity | David Bradshaw | Episode 2
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- Опубликовано: 5 фев 2025
- Tune in to hear Dr. Jacobs discuss the essence / energies distinction with Dr. David Bradshaw.
You can find a comprehensive list of Dr. Bradshaw's work on his Academia profile: uky.academia.e...
Find his books on Amazon:
Aristotle East and West: Metaphysics and the Division of Christendom: a.co/d/aNlT0Ws
Divine Energies and Divine Action: Exploring the Essence-Energies Distinction: a.co/d/5uYdB08
Dr. Jacobs' links:
Spotify: open.spotify.c...
Apple Podcast: podcasts.apple...
Instagram: / thenathanjacobspodcast
Substack: nathanajacobs....
Website: www.nathanajac...
Academia: vanderbilt.aca...
You can find a comprehensive list of Dr. Bradshaw's work on his Academia profile: uky.academia.edu/DBradshaw
Find his books on Amazon:
Aristotle East and West: Metaphysics and the Division of Christendom: a.co/d/aNlT0Ws
Divine Energies and Divine Action: Exploring the Essence-Energies Distinction: a.co/d/5uYdB08
Fantastic! These two philosophers have had a significant impact on the Orthodox Church. It's wonderful to see them chatting.
Thank you for the support! -- JB, producer
As a Physicist I am immensely grateful to Dr Bradshaw. Physics naturally leads to a questioning of notions of time, work and energy. This is even true for young High School students. I feel Dr Bradshaw really gets to the heart of this in a way which is totally relatable to Physicists because he is one. He helps to break the artificial barriers between the study of science, metaphysics and theology and this is important 'work' he may not realise he is doing!
Dr. Bradshaw is a physicist?
@@educationalporpoises9592 he started out as one, yes.
Thank you 🙏🏽
This is why I also majored in existentialism as an atheist. No longer of course!
1:21:30 book reference
1:57:19 bookmark
Wow, this conversation really blessed me thank you both!
As a painter primarily interested in the Beauty of Nature, and the beauty in human faces, are we participating a little bit in God's Divine Energies when we paint?
Hey Nathan long time student of yours at TIU here, Aron. Enjoying the podcast and want to run something by you I've been musing on, concerning theosis and the point of the Fall which was brought up in this video.
I'm thinking that Adam and Eve were naturally inclined toward the fruit of the tree since, presumably, the knowledge of good and evil accords with humanity's telos to be like God. I read the fruit as offering a further participation in the life of God as judge over the cosmos, which we are destined for as God's image. The Fall occurred when Adam and Eve disobeyed the command not to eat in the following manner.
When presented with the opportunity to partake of the knowledge of good and evil, which God possesses (Gen. 3:22), Adam and Eve were given another opportunity - to enter into 'worshipful obedience.' That is, instead of reaching for the fruit in order to ascribe wisdom, glory and power to themselves, to liken themselves unto God/gods, they could have instead abstained from the fruit by falling down and ascribing all wisdom, glory and power to God alone. This, I like to think, would have resulted in theosis as they would have joined in the heavenly choir/liturgy/pattern of angels (Rev. 5:13), and been transformed into holy ones who reign with God on high. In other words, they would have been made fit for the heavenly sanctuary.
But, whenever anyone steps out from worshipful obedience, then their natural inclination towards a good changes into a lust for that good as seen in the language used to describe Eve's engagement with the tree and its fruit. This I see is the crossroads between entrance into the passions or entrance into the life of God in full, and of course we repeat this pattern daily whether we follow the Spirit or the flesh.
Glad I could run these thoughts by you, only reply back if you find it interesting please. I'm wondering if this places heavy emphasis on Adam and Eve's will from your perspective, or how you might interpret my thoughts on the Fall? Thanks for all the wonderful content in the classroom and on youtube!
Wonderful ❤😂
Curious on your statement at about 1:25:00 saying Augustine has a wrong Trinitarian ousia and hypostasis distinction. I agree. Have you read/heard Dr. Beau Branson on teh Trinity and the identity of the One God?
1:14 bookmark
Let's see if we can push one of the analogies a little too far. When I hum the St Matthew passion am I participating in Bach's energies? Just kidding about pushing an analogy too far. That's an honest question I have
It's a good question. Dr. Jacobs will be doing a Q&A episode in the next few weeks and I'll throw it in the pile for him! -- JB, producer
So, in other words, are you asking if it is only the divine energies we can participate in or are we all participating in others’ energies? That could be limitless. Kinda of a scary thought. I would think what Bach produced reflected a divine energy and so when you hum Bach you’re participating in a derivative of the divine energy and not Bach’s. Lol, I have no idea. I’m just a no one who knows nothing, but that was a fun question to ponder so thanks for indulging me.
@@gracenroses7471 Interesting. FWIW, Nathan did address my question in the q&a episode from a couple weeks ago. Basically to my question he said 'kinda' 🙂
@@kgrant67 lol oh good to know he answered the question. I will have to go listen. Thanks!
More resources on EO and time?
Dr. Bradshaw has two papers on the subject. If you head to his Academia (linked in the description) you’ll find them. One is called “St. Maximus on Time, Eternity, and Divine Knowledge” and the other “Time and Eternity in the Greek Fathers.”
This is all very clever talk. However, Bach does not know what note he will play beforehand, yet God would. How do you explain that? You explained how we could inherit the freedom of God, yet limit him in doing so. From my understanding God has foreknowledge in Christianity, and from that we can conclude we are not free.
Free will is an underpinning of Orthodoxy understanding of Salvation, and a gift of God to us.
Bradshaw is not a representative of Orthodoxy. His weird fusion of Anglo‐American analytic philosophy and what he takes to be a Palamite reading of the Fathers is awful, as is his historically wildly wrong narrative of Patristic tradition. He might convince lots of evangelical converts, but no serious person.
1:39:42 - you don't have to suppose God has different acts for Him to know different possibilities. He can know by one act of understanding, how all possible reality goes. Aquinas obviously says that God is His own act of understanding.
"Since therefore God has nothing in Him of potentiality, but is pure act, His intellect and its object are altogether the same; so that He neither is without the intelligible species, as is the case with our intellect when it understands potentially; nor does the intelligible species differ from the substance of the divine intellect, as it differs in our intellect when it understands actually; but the intelligible species itself is the divine intellect itself, and thus God understands Himself through Himself."
And this is the basis of His knowledge of the world:
"Now if anything is perfectly known, it follows of necessity that its power is perfectly known. But the power of anything can be perfectly known only by knowing to what its power extends. Since therefore the divine power extends to other things by the very fact that it is the first effective cause of all things, as is clear from the aforesaid (Q. 2, A. 3), God must necessarily know things other than Himself.
And this appears still more plainly if we add that the very existence of the first effective cause-viz., God-is His own act of understanding. Hence whatever effects pre-exist in God, as in the first cause, must be in His act of understanding, and all things must be in Him according to an intelligible mode: for everything which is in another, is in it according to the mode of that in which it is."
Aquinas obviously holds that God doesn't change after creation “I the LORD do not change." His whole concept of creation is developed so there's no change in God, creation is a relation to God inherent in a creature. Yes, the world is non-necessary and yes God has a reason to create it but remains free precisely because no part of the world is a necessary result of His existence, there's no such uncreated thing as time. Time is a result of change and God doesn't change. The Son is necessary but His humanity isn't. Because He became human in time. A temporal nature bears a special relation to the Second Person of the Trinity
I think the best one can say is that both God and man are free but neither know the future.
try again
I just started watching the video, and straight away - no, the Cappadocians DID NOT teach the Palamite invention of a real distinction of essence and energy in God. On the contrary, the Church Fathers unanimously teach the doctrine of divine simplicity.
Furthermore, at 1:02:34 David Bradshaw claims that the Fathers never teach that the Saints in heaven attain to the knowledge of the divine essence.
That is completely false. Several Church Fathers clearly teach the doctrine of the beatific vision - St Gregory Nazianzen, St Augustine, St Cyril of Alexandria, St Gregory the Great ..., not to mention this doctrine is clearly taught at several places in the Bible.
For anyone else reading this comment section, this guys is what being confidently incorrect looks like.
You confuse absolute divine simplicity with divine simplicity@@CatholicSedevacantist
No greek speaking father says about the possibility of knowledge of God's essence
@@CatholicSedevacantist no where in the Bible is the possibility to know thd essence of God. Actually Paul writes in greek so many times about the ενέργεια. Ενεργηματα energies of God.