Zain's Guide to Overthinking Everything

Aristotle’s Metaphysics Book Alpha Overview     According to Aristotle, there are four types of causes which all work together:   1. Formal Cause: It is the essence of a thing which makes it the type of thing that it is. It can also refer to the whole of the thing or its form. The form is the act which gives it its shape and identity while the matter is the potency which the thing is made out of. 2. Material Cause: The matter a thing is made out of. He criticized earlier philosophers like Thales and Heraclitus for limiting their explanations to only a material cause such as water and fire respectively. Relying solely on a material cause does not explain why or how something is the way it is. 3. Efficient Cause: What brings something into existence or produces it. A substrate itself does not cause itself to change or motion. There cannot be an infinite regress of efficient causes therefore there must be a prime mover or uncaused cause, God. Some poets like Hesiod...

Debating The Filioque and Incarnation: A Comparative Analysis of Eastern Orthodox and Thomistic Perspectives on the Trinity The Eastern Orthodox claim that the three persons in the Trinity have the same divine will and power since they are the One God. However, if one does not affirm that they have the possibility of becoming incarnate then this would entail that they do not have the same power as only the Son has the power to become incarnate, while the Father and Holy Spirit cannot. If there are three persons who are each divine and yet share different powers then there is a strong argument that this leads to three gods rather than one. The idea that the Son alone has the power to become incarnate comes from Book 4 Chapter 4 of An Exposition of the Orthodox Faith by John of Damascus, “The Father is Father and not Son: the Son is Son and not Father: the Holy Spirit is Spirit and not Father or Son. For the individuality is unchangeable. How, indeed, could individuality continue to exi...

Dialogue with Aquinas: A Systematic Refutation of Divine Simplicity     Introduction:            The Doctrine of Divine Simplicity (DS) has been held by the Church for centuries through the works of great theologians such as Augustine and Thomas Aquinas. However, under scrutiny it will be demonstrated that the doctrine has no legs to stand on. Firstly, a systematic articulation of DS will be provided for background context. Secondly, I will offer several objections and incoherencies that DS entails. Thirdly, I will provide a possible alternate solution to understanding the relationship between God’s attributes and essence. This essay-style blog post will replace all of my other blogs on the same subject as this is the synthesis of them.   Chapter I: What is Divine Simplicity? Divine simplicity (DS) is the idea that God's attributes are identical to each other in His reality. Attributes, for example, are love, wrath, know...