Elements of Theology, Proposition 10
Jun. 19th, 2024 08:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
readoldthings Every thing which is self-sufficient is inferior to that which is simply good.
Imagine ice cream. First there is Ice Cream Itself, which is beyond all particular forms of ice cream. This is the unparticipated Good. Then there is Vanilla, Strawberry, Chocolate, Mint Chocolate Chip, Rocky Road, Cookie Dough, Birthday Cake, Cookies 'n' Cream, and so on. Like Ice Cream Itself, these are undeniably ice cream. Unlike Ice Cream Itself, they may be eaten. They are not "filled with ice cream"; they simply are Ice Cream. These are the Henads, the participable goods.
Imagine an Ice Cream Truck. This supplies its own Ice Cream. That is what it means to "be self-sufficient." Something which is self sufficient fills itself with the Good, as the ice cream truck fills itself with Ice Cream. Unlike the Ice Cream, the Ice Cream truck isn't ice cream. But it does supply its own Ice Cream. Ice Cream Trucks are the Forms, which both participate and are participated.
Last comes you. You don't have any Ice Cream, and you can't supply your own Ice Cream. You are dependent on the Ice Cream Truck for your Ice Cream. You buy your Ice Cream, and once you eat it, it's all gone. If you want more, you have to wait for the Ice Cream Truck, which is always filled with Ice Cream and never runs out in the Summertime, to come round again. This is life in the material world, and this is what it means to be a participant in the Forms, "participating in the Good through another."
For what else is the self-sufficient than that which from and in itself possesses good? But this is now full of good, and participates of it, but is not that which is simply good: for that is better than participation and plenitude, as has been demonstrated. If therefore the self-sufficient fills itself with good, that from which it [10] fills itself will be better than the self-sufficient, and will be superior to self-sufficiency. And that which is simply good will not be indigent of any thing: for it does not desire any thing else, since the desiring would indicate a deficiency. Nor is the simply good self-sufficient, for in that case it would be full of good, but not that which is primarily The Good.
COMMENTARYImagine ice cream. First there is Ice Cream Itself, which is beyond all particular forms of ice cream. This is the unparticipated Good. Then there is Vanilla, Strawberry, Chocolate, Mint Chocolate Chip, Rocky Road, Cookie Dough, Birthday Cake, Cookies 'n' Cream, and so on. Like Ice Cream Itself, these are undeniably ice cream. Unlike Ice Cream Itself, they may be eaten. They are not "filled with ice cream"; they simply are Ice Cream. These are the Henads, the participable goods.
Imagine an Ice Cream Truck. This supplies its own Ice Cream. That is what it means to "be self-sufficient." Something which is self sufficient fills itself with the Good, as the ice cream truck fills itself with Ice Cream. Unlike the Ice Cream, the Ice Cream truck isn't ice cream. But it does supply its own Ice Cream. Ice Cream Trucks are the Forms, which both participate and are participated.
Last comes you. You don't have any Ice Cream, and you can't supply your own Ice Cream. You are dependent on the Ice Cream Truck for your Ice Cream. You buy your Ice Cream, and once you eat it, it's all gone. If you want more, you have to wait for the Ice Cream Truck, which is always filled with Ice Cream and never runs out in the Summertime, to come round again. This is life in the material world, and this is what it means to be a participant in the Forms, "participating in the Good through another."
