ANALOGY OF BEING
ANALOGY OF BEING
The
mind compares different things on the basis of some relationship they bear to
each other. Different things receive a common name because they bear a relation
to something that the common name principally signifies.
St
Thomas Aquinas gave a threefold division of analogy.
1. Analogy
according to signification only. Here there is no analogy from the point of
view of actual existence but only in the signification of a common name applied
to common things
2. Analogy
in existence but not in signification. This kind of analogy occurs when several
different things have one and the same significationbut differ in degree of
perfection in which they possess the reality signified
3. Analogy
in existence and signification. In this case there is absolute identity neither
in signification nor in the mode of existence, but there is similarity.
Analogy can be done in three
different ways – univocal, equivocal, and analogous. A term is univocal when a concept is used to
predicate on diverse things according the same concept exactly, equivocal when
is predicate on different things according to entirely different concepts, and
analogous which are and the same name is predicted on many according concept
which are not entirely the same but they seems to agree on some common point.
In analogy the science of
metaphysics investigates the causes of a genus and the genus itself. When analogy is made with God, it is in
similitude and not in proportionate, since when things are said to be
proportional it seems to mean definite measure.
Therefore it is fitting to use proportionally between God and creatures.
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