A TERM PAPER:

Discussing the importance of the Doctrine of Simplicity of God in

supporting the framework of God’s Aseity, Infinity and Immutability

By
Japheth De la Cruz
Introduction

Why is Simplicity of God is not simple? The question stands not afar on different

theological views but the word simple isn’t a word that most will want to attribute to a Deity or

God. In the pedestal of Philosophy and other branches of knowledge like Metaphysical,

Epistemology and Ethics -- their fundamental nature lies on the analysis of a deeper intersections

of ideas and applications1. Making it complex as to what comprises it or make it complete. A

watch moves because of its intricate cogwheels that compose it. Like in our bodies, the organs

that composed our body systems which supports the different functions in our body completes a

whole human physiology. But the Simplicity of God is not measured by the complexities of

attributes and essentials that entails His being. When we speak of the simplicity of God, we use

the term to describe the state or quality of being simple, the condition of being free from division

into parts, and therefore from compositeness2. Puritan Stephen Charnock states this basic

definition in his own words.

“God is the most simple being; for that which is first in nature, having nothing
beyond it, cannot by any means be thought to be compounded; for whatsoever
is so, depends upon the parts whereof it is compounded, and so is not the first
being: now God being infinitely simple, hath nothing in himself which is not
himself, and therefore cannot will any change in himself, he being his own
essence and existence.3”

In Charnock’s words, His essence and existence is one. We cannot compound God. He is not a

mixture of love, justice, wisdom, and power. God is not a being that contains cup of different

liquid. If I say a bottle of Coke, we may say that a bottle is a coke’s because it holds the liquid,

therefore it’s not a Coke without the liquid inside it or vice – versa, it’s not a coke without the

printed bottle. Augustine made a rebuttal out this kind of thought in his work City of God and

said:

“Those things which are essentially and truly divine are called simple, because
in them quality and substance are identical, and because they are divine, or
wise, or blessed in themselves, and without extraneous supplement”.4

It contends that the first cause of all being must be simple for the straightforward reason that

complex or compound things depend upon parts that are more fundamental in being than

themselves5. It means that God is not separate to His attribute and being. One major biblical text

1
2
Louis berfhof, page 66
3
The existence and attribute of God, Volume VII, page 118
4
City of God Volume VII page 320
5
Tabletalk Magazine 2018 The Simplicity of God by James E. Dolezal
that explain this is in 1 Jn. 4:8, the Apostle John said: “Anyone who does not love does not know

God, because God is love.6. In here we often make an assumption that God is loving and it

should be interpreted that God is loving instead of the original, and therefore, we must follow the

way God loves. Although we are to love one another because it is one of the fundamental mark

of being a Christian. However, it is not exactly what it says. The Greek translation of love in this

verse is ἀγάπη or agapē which means “love or divine love” from its verb form ἀγαπάω or agapaó

meaning “to love”. In short Apostle John is telling us we are to love one another because God

simply is love. His being is love, and to demonstrate love is to demonstrate His being to us. Or to

say to love is to demonstrate God. The simplicity of God is very crucial to the tenets of

understanding the attributes of God, that this doctrine verify the sound teaching of other

attributes taught in reformed circles, like aseity, immutability, unity, and absoluteness. That to

remove or reject the simplicity of God is tantamount to reject the core of God’s being. Here are

some of the correlation between God’s simplicity to the other attributes.

God’s Aseity

Aseity insist that Godof who and what he is. “God is absolute being, the fullness of

being, and therefore always eternally and absolutely independent in his existence, in his

perfections, in all his works, the first and the last, the sole cause and final goal of all things”.7

Bavinck clearly asserts the notion of divine simplicity on the account the Aseitic attribute of God

and independence. One of the Church Father, Anselm in his work Monologium discusses more

briefly about the absolute self – sufficiency of God:

“But, in no wise does the supreme Nature exist through another, nor is it later
or less than itself or anything else. Therefore, the supreme Nature could be
created neither by itself, nor by another; nor could itself or any other be the
matter whence it should be created; nor did it assist itself in any way; nor did
anything assist it to be what it was not before.8”

Anselm explained that Aseitic attribute of God to be justified, that what he rejects that God is

caused by another and that he is self – caused. Existence is existence through a cause and the

dependence in some sort: For what is said to exist through anything have exist through an

efficient of cause or through some external source. Anselm, affirms, that although God exist

6
Crossway ESV Bible, italics mine.
7
Bavinck Reform Dogmatics Vol. II
8
“The Aseity of God in St. Anselm,” 35–44.
through Himself, he is not self – cause by itself. God didn’t derive Himself from any

participation of its action and His attributes. God alone is the absolute sufficient condition for the

existence of non-divine things; they exist through him. Likewise, he is the absolute sufficient

condition for his own existence; he exists through himself. But, while the existence of creatures

through God is necessarily understood as effects existing through a cause, God’s existence

through himself cannot possibly be conceived in this way. Self-existence is neither self-causation

nor self-dependence9. To maintain that God is a se (from self) is to say that God himself is

sufficient ontological condition and explanation for His existence and essence. But there is a lot

of room for questions, like what it is about God that accounts for His aseity? George Joyce in his

book Nature of Theology summarized the question:

“The real significance of the notion Ens a se (a being in itself) is to deny that
God is, like creatures, caused by another. He is conceived as self-existent in the
sense of ‘unoriginated.’” “But,” he hastens to add, “it still remains for us to
ask what is the internal constitutive, in virtue of which He is unoriginated and
needs no cause. And to reply to this question we must fall back on our concept
of Him as subsistent existence—as the Being whose existence is His nature”10.

In short to answer God’s aseity we must consider one distinct attribute of God: His simplicity. If

God has parts, His being would depend on His parts. Those parts would be before or after Him

and defining His being. So he would not be a being who is entirely a first being. The basic logic

is that if God were composed of parts he would, in some sense, depend upon those parts

inasmuch as those parts would be indispensible to the explanation of his existence and essence11.

Therefore, Divine Simplicity is the ground considering God as a se and prevents it from

becoming a doctrine from self-causation, self-origin, or self-reliance.

Infinity

Most of us know the word “infinity”. We perceived it as something that goes beyond

limits and goes forever and ever. When we thought of God, we say that He is infinite because He

is free from all limitation. It implies that He is in no way limited by the universe, by the time-

space world, or confined to the universe. It does not involve His identity with the sum-total of

9
Dolezal, James E.. God without Parts: Divine Simplicity and the Metaphysics of God's Absoluteness

10
George Joyce, Principles of Natural Theology, 297.

11
Dolezal, James E. God without Parts: Divine Simplicity and the Metaphysics of God's

Absoluteness (Kindle Locations 2163-2164).

existing things, nor does it exclude the co-existence of derived and finite things, to which He

bears relation12. When we talk about the infinity of God we always recognize God’s absolute

perfection, His eternity, and His immensity. His absolute perfection talks about exhaustless

potency of power, infinite holiness which is free from all limitations, absolute in all aspect in

knowledge, wisdom, love, righteousness, and justice. His being is internally qualitatively without

limitations, and boundless in potentiality. And relatively, He is eternal. He is the eternal “I am.”

His eternity may be defined as that perfection of God; whereby He is elevated above all temporal

limits and all succession of moments, and possesses the whole of His existence in one indivisible

present13. And His immensity that may be defined as that perfection of the Divine Being by

which He transcends all spatial limitations, and yet is present in every point of space with His

whole Being14. In view in all of this the doctrine of Divine Simplicity perfectly backs up the

infinity of God. Thomas Aquinas notes that Divine Simplicity in correlation with God’s infinite

nature of Oneness [as a whole, not be parts], that it above limitation and classification can be

said as “simple” or “perfection”. Since God is not under any classification and simple in nature

of perfection: the idea of divine simplicity fits God’s infinity. Thomas Aquinas notes,

“everything that according to its nature is finite is determined to the nature of some genus.” The

idea of God composed of parts nullify the His infinity since those parts could pose limitations.

Aquinas continues that everything composed of acts and potency, its composition, is limited or

short of perfection. A being’s finitude can be analyzed in many ways in creature’s composition

which is contrary to Divine Infinity. Thus Divine Simplicity justify and verify God’s infinity.

Immutability

God’s immutability is implication of God’s infinity. It is the principle that God does not

change. That He is the same God, in our perspective- past, present, and future, that His promises

does not change. It is however, an ethical immutability that we are defining. One question does

actually pops out to our mind is, what is it about God that makes His word infallible, compare to

other relatively promise makers? The answer is found in God’s ontological immutability which

entailed by His Divine Simplicity. Aquinas identify that God is “altogether immutable” because

of God’s lack of potency [potential] and his ever act [action].

“God is altogether immutable. First, because . . . first being must be pure act,
without the admixture of any potentiality, for the reason that, absolutely,

12
Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology
13
Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology
14
Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology
 potentiality is posterior to act. Now everything which is in any way changed, is
in some way in potentiality . . . Secondly, because everything which is moved,
remains as it was in part, and passes away in part; as what is moved from
whiteness to blackness, remains the same as to substance; thus in everything
which is moved, there is some kind of composition to be found. But . . . in God
there is no composition, for He is altogether simple. Hence it is manifest that
God cannot be moved”15.

It presupposes that God lacks potency since God, as infinite, as He cannot stand open to the

reception of a further act of being. As Aquinas further discussed: “He cannot acquire anything

new, nor extend Himself to anything whereto He was not extended previously.”16 In every mutable

thing there is found some actuality as well as passive potency toward some other accidental or

substantial form of being.17 But in God there is and always that act of continuous potency. The

doctrine of Divine Simplicity upholds and protect God’s immutability by stating that God’s

immutability cannot be dissected because of His oneness or simplicity. We cannot make

classifications, and categorization on the being of God because He is simple. Stephen Charnock

summarizes this argument: “If God were not a Spirit, he were not immutable and unchangeable.

His immutability depends upon his simplicity. He is unchangeable in his essence, because he is a

pure and unmixed spiritual Being. Whatsoever is compounded of parts may be divided into those

parts, and resolved into those distinct parts which make up and constitute the nature. Whatsoever

is compounded is changeable in its own nature, though it should never be changed18”.

Another important truth about the immutability of God by Divine Simplicity is to make it

certain that the Doctrine of Immutability should have not fallen into characterization of Karl

Barth’s Philosophy that defines God’s “Immobility” as “stagnant” or “dead”. Making an statement

that a God that’s not moving or changing is a dead god since it lacks the ability to be mobile. This

misconstrue that God is immobile. He is mobile in a sense of “Holy Mutability”. Such a thing as

a holy mutability in God. He is above all ages. But above them as their Lord . . . and therefore as

One who—as Master and in His own way—partakes in their alteration, so that there is something

corresponding to that alteration in His own essence. His constancy consists in the fact that he is

always the same in every change.19 Divine Simplicity instill the notion of dynamic liveliness and

absolute actuality. so that to say God is immobile in no way suggests that he is inactive. A thing

15
Summa Theological
16
Summa theological
17
Dolezal, James E.. God without Parts: Divine Simplicity and the Metaphysics of God's
Absoluteness
18
Existence and Essence of God, I: 187
19
McCormack, “The Actuality of God,” 231–32.
can be considered immobile in two senses: either (1) because of its radical paucity of act or (2)

because it possesses act so perfectly and completely that it cannot possibly be moved to receive

further actuality20. Thomas Weinandy illustrates the difference and account this two ways:

“One should not be misled into thinking that God’s immutability is like the
immutability of a rock only more so. What God and rocks appear to have in
common is only the fact that they do not change. The reason for their
unchangeableness is for polar-opposite reasons. The Rock of Gibraltar does
not change or changes very little because it is hardly in act at all, and the
change that it does undergo is mainly from outside causes—wind and rain. God
is unchangeable not because he is inert or static like a rock, but for just the
opposite reason. He is so dynamic, so active.21”

The idea of pure immobile “death” wrap around in the idea of passive potency is disallowed in

the Divine Simplicity because it denies the act and potency of God and insist that God is

existence itself. Finally, Divine Simplicity furnishes the ontological immutability of God which

is the source of our trust and faith towards God. It ensures that immutability is really the

unchangeableness of an absolute life and activity.

Conclusion

The goal of this paper is to emphasize that proper understanding of Divine Simplicity will

protect the Godness of God from human error who have different views that results to distortion

and misalign comprehension of His divinity, which is not of God. Thus with correlation checked

and bridged, Divine Simplicity in my opinion must lie in the cornerstone of our theology if we if

really want to build up our foundational understanding of these attributes. To further expand our

worship and service to our Lord, in which we confess to “To know Him and to enjoy Him”.

20
Dolezal, James E.. God without Parts: Divine Simplicity and the Metaphysics of God's
Absoluteness
21
Weinandy, Does God Change? 78–79.