The Knowledge of God

The soul of man, being intellectual, can know God of itself, if it be true to its own nature. … But for its knowledge and accurate comprehension, there is need of none other save of ourselves. Neither as God Himself is above all, is the road to Him afar off or outside ourselves, but it is in us and it is possible to find it from ourselves…

Against the Heathen (Contra Gentiles), by St. Athanasius (html)

This is how St. Athanasius begins part 2 of this work. On first reading of this introduction, my eyebrows were raised just a bit. There must be something revealed for us to know of God, after all. St. Athanasius, of course, concurs.

St. Athanasius is writing against the heathen – the Greeks who worship idols. Yet, even in the time of the apostle Paul, the Greeks clearly understood there was something more – with their Temple to the Unknown God.

And if one were to ask, what road is this? I say that it is the soul of each one of us, and the intelligence which resides there. For by it alone can God be contemplated and perceived.

Men possessed of intellect cannot deny the existence of God; those who deny God’s existence have already repudiated having a soul. St. Athanasius refers to this as the “rational soul.”

Genesis 1: 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

Genesis 2: 7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.

St. Athanasius does not introduce these verses in his argument; he is making arguments from nature. But this explanation from Genesis remains the best explanation of just how man came to be man – a creature with a rational soul. These two things are said of no other creature. This is what makes man different from the “brutes,” and it is what gives man the power of objective thought.

… man alone thinks of things external to himself, and reasons about things not actually present, and exercises reflection, and chooses by judgment the better of alternative reasonings. … And every one, if he be a friend of truth, perceives that the intelligence of mankind is distinct from the bodily senses.

Man’s intellect acts as a judge of the senses. It distinguishes, recollects, and shows him what is best. The eyes see, the ears hear – but it is the intellect that determines what man will see, what man will hear. It is the intellect that knows what is safe and what is injurious.

But this alone is peculiar to mankind, and this is what is rational in the soul of mankind, by means of which it differs from the brutes…

Now, an objection might be raised. There are some of these “brutes” that display at least something approaching the discernment found in man. This isn’t denied. But the distance between man and even the highest non-human creature is immense – not even comparable in any sense.

Often, for example, when the body is lying on the earth, man imagines and contemplates what is in the heavens. … But to what can this be due save to the rational soul, in which man thinks of and perceives things beyond himself?

Man contemplates the eternal, he considers immortality. For these reasons, St. Athanasius considers that the soul is immortal. He offers some examples, or proofs, of this connection – since man contemplates immortality, it must be so that the soul is immortal. For example:

For if our argument has proved [the soul] to be distinct from the body, while the body is by nature mortal, it follows that the soul is immortal, because it is not like the body.

And just as, the body being mortal, its senses also have mortal things as their objects, so, since the soul contemplates and beholds immortal things, it follows that it is immortal and lives forever.

These proofs don’t really work for me, but I won’t try to parse this out; just presenting these for completeness.

St. Athanasius next moves to the witness of nature as proof of God.

Creation a revelation of God; especially in the order and harmony pervading the whole. … since He is by nature invisible, men might be enabled to know Him at any rate by His works.

It is the order of the universe that bears witness to God.

Romans 1: 20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse…

The contrariness in nature further speaks to its order, for example, water is heavy, yet held up by the clouds. There is one higher, a Lord that rules over all – where even the elements yield obedience.

Or how could man, or any animal, have appeared upon earth, if the elements were mutually at strife, or if there were one that prevailed, and that one insufficient for the composition of bodies.

The necessities for life, such a very fine balance. Could this be only by chance, by random processes? Or, instead, is there One who governs? Wherever we find order, we find something, or someone, governing. Will this not also be the case for the universe?

Conclusion

St. Athanasius makes a very interesting point: just as the human soul brings order to the body, God brings order to the universe. In other words, God is the “soul” of the universe. Consider this: a body without the soul is a dead body. What happens if God removes His soul from the universe?

…so, the order of the whole universe being perfectly harmonious, and there being no strife of the higher against the lower or the lower against the higher, and all things making up one order, it is consistent to think that the Ruler and King of all Creation is one and not many, Who by His own light illumines and gives movement to all.

It is considered by some, even now physicists, that the source of the universe is to be found in mind. That mind is God’s soul. It gives movement to all, and without it, there is no movement…death.