DIVINE NOTIONS. - These are theological terms expressing those characteristic notes by which the individual divine Persons may be distinctly recognized. Five are usually enumerated: unbegottenness, paternity, filiation, active spiration, and procession.
In God there are two immanent processions (q.v.), corresponding to the two divine operations, intellect and will (thought and love), from which arise four relations (q.v.), of which three are numerically and really distinct and thus constitute the three Persons (Paternity = Father; Filiation = Son; Procession = Holy Spirit). These three subsistent relations are also strictly personal properties; two other properties, though personal, do not constitute the Persons but characterize them: these are unbegottenness, proper to the Father (who derives from no one), and active spiration, which belongs to the Father and the Son in relation to the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from them.
The notions coincide with the relations and personal properties that denote the individual Persons distinctly. Therefore, while the three relation-properties—paternity, filiation, and procession—are also notions, active spiration is not, since it is common to two Persons (Father and Son). Moreover, unbegottenness, though not a relation, is a notion because it exclusively indicates the Person of the Father. In substance, the notions serve to connote the individual Persons of the Most Holy Trinity unambiguously.
Alongside the notions, the notional acts must be recalled; there are two of these: begetting and spirating (four, if the two verbs are also considered in the passive sense). "Begetting" is nothing other than the first procession and thus denotes the eternal divine act of intellect in relation to the two terms, Father (thinking) and Son (thought). Similarly, "spirating" is equivalent to the second procession and denotes the act of will, which has as its principle the Father and the Son together and as its term the Holy Spirit.
Underlying the processions and the notional acts is the immanent activity of God—thought and love—which are essential attributes and become notional when referred to the Persons; thus thinking is an absolute action, identical with the divine essence, but when referred to the thinking principle (Father) and the thought term (Son), it assumes a personal and hence notional character (thinking = begetting the idea: from the Father to the Son).
Likewise, willing is an absolute action, identical with the divine essence, which becomes personal and notional in relation to the terms, which are on the one hand the Father and the Son, and on the other the Holy Spirit (willing = spirating love).
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