Chapter Seven of the Second Decade
On the power and efficacy of angels, concerning which three little questions will be resolved
Question One of Chapter Seven of the Second Decade
How angels can alter the interior and exterior powers of human beings
It is asked whether angels can alter the interior and exterior powers of human beings.
To this it is answered as follows. By their power over corporeal matter and by their influence upon human beings, angels can alter, and sometimes do alter, their powers: they incline the sense, move the affection, and illuminate the intellect.
First, they can alter either sense—namely the interior and the exterior—in two ways.
First, either by forming some sensible thing anew or by placing before the sense something formed by nature.
Second, by moving the spirits and humors within.
Thus it is read in Genesis, chapter 19, that the angels who overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah struck the Sodomites with blindness or acrisia, so that they could not enter the door of the house.
And a similar thing is read in Book IV of Kings, chapter 6, concerning the Syrians whom Elisha led into Samaria.
These things are from Blessed Thomas, First Part of the Summa, question 111, article 4.
Second, angels can alter the rational appetite of a human being, namely the will.
Here take notice that a human being’s will can be altered in two ways: from within and from without.
First, from within; and in this way God alone can alter a human being’s will.
The reason is that, since to will is to incline the will toward the thing willed, just as a natural inclination comes only from God, who gives nature, so a voluntary inclination comes only from him who causes the will, namely God.
Whence Proverbs, chapter 21, says: “The heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord, and wherever he wills, he will turn it.”
The Gloss says: “The heart—that is, the will—of the king is in the hand, that is, in the power, not of himself but of God. And wherever he wills, he will turn it: either toward hardness or toward gentleness, toward good or toward evil.”
Second, a human being’s will can be altered from without. And in this way an angel can alter the will—that is, allure or incline it—in two ways.
In one way, by showing or presenting an object exteriorly.
In another way, by stirring up the sensitive appetite interiorly toward some passion, for example toward anger or concupiscence.
From these two things a human being’s will is inclined toward willing something. Nevertheless, the human will is not compelled or necessitated by these two things, because the will always remains free to consent to the exterior persuasion or the interior affection.
These things are from Blessed Thomas, First Part, question 111, article 2, in the body of the question.
Third, angels can illuminate a human being’s intellect insofar as they teach human beings intelligible truth by similitudes of sensible things, according to that saying of Dionysius in chapter 1 of The Celestial Hierarchy: “It is impossible for the divine ray to shine upon us otherwise than by being enveloped round about with a variety of sacred veils.”
This is also proved by the similitude of a mirror. For Dionysius says in the book On the Divine Names that angels and souls are spiritual mirrors.
Whence, just as when one material mirror is placed before another material mirror, the appearances represented in one are generated and represented in the other, so it can be that a spiritual mirror—namely, an angel—places itself before a soul; and thus the appearances which it receives from God it pours into the soul and illuminates the intellect for knowing divine things and having good thoughts.
Alexander places this example in the Second Part of the Summa, question 39.
But perhaps you will ask and say: concerning what things does an angel illuminate a human being’s intellect?
It is answered: concerning four things, namely things to be thought, known, believed, and done.
First, concerning things to be thought—not, indeed, by principally sending in or producing good thoughts, because in this manner good thoughts are attributed to the superior principle, namely God; but by procuring them, insofar as good thoughts are procured through the ministry of angels, according as good angels illuminate, make capable, or excite the intellect to have good thoughts, by inwardly infusing or strengthening good phantasms, or by removing all impediments.
Second, good angels illuminate a human being’s intellect concerning things to be known. For through good angels a human being is aided and illuminated so that from creatures he may arrive more perfectly at divine cognition.
Third, good angels illuminate concerning things to be believed, insofar as divine things are principally revealed to human beings through good angels, and faith is thus caused in them.
Fourth, they illuminate concerning things to be done, for from the fact that they illuminate concerning faith and things to be believed, they operate toward the operation of faith.
These things are from Blessed Thomas, First Part, question 111, article 1.