Tuesday, November 8, 2022

John Duns Scotus (1265/66-1308) Appealing to Revelation 22:18

  

203. But there is a doubt whether their theology is about everything although there be some other theology about certain knowables. Here a distinction must be made about theology in itself and as it is a habit perfecting the blessed created intellect. In the first way it is about all knowables, because they are all of a nature to be known by virtue of the first theological object; in the second way, I saw that it is possible for it to be about any knowable, because it is about all knowables, for all the knowables are not infinite. De facto, however, it has no limitation save from the will of God displaying something in his essence; and therefore the knowledge of the blessed is in actuality about as many things as God voluntarily shows them in his essence.

 

204. [On our theology] – About our theology I say that it is not actually of everything, because just as the theology of the blessed has a limit, so also does ours, form the will of God revealing. But the limit prefixed by the divine will as to general revelation is of the things that are in divine Scripture, because – as it contained in the last chapter of Revelation 22.18 – “he who adds to these things, to him will God add the plagues that are set down in this book.” Therefore, our knowledge is de facto only of the things contained in Scripture and of the things that can be elicited from them. (John Duns Scotus, The Ordinatio of Blessed John Dun Scotus, Volume 1: On Revelation and Theology [Militant Thomist Press, 2022], 101)

 

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