Sect. 68The Eternity of GodThe Eternity of God

I. The Divine Eternity signifies (1) that the duration of God is above and independent of time, inasmuch as He has neither beginning nor end and is in no wise limited by time, but coexists with and exceeds all time; (2) that the Divine duration is absolutely without change or succession, and is in no way affected by the flow of time; (3) that the duration of God is absolutely and essentially indivisible: it admits of no past or future, but is an ever-standing present. The simplicity and virtual extension of God’s duration are a superabundant equivalent for all real and possible time. All this is admirably summed up in the well-known definition given by Boëthius (De Consol Phil., l. v., prop. 6): “Æternitas est interminabilis vitæ tota simul et perfecta possessio”—”Eternity is the possession, perfect and all at once, of life without beginning or end.” That is to say, God’s activity is absolutely changeless, but yet is life indestructible; all limit is excluded from this life, but yet endlessness is a consequence of Eternity rather than its essence; and this life is possessed “all at once,” to show that there is no succession in it, but that God in His everpresent “now” enjoys everything that He could have possessed or can ever possess.

1. Holy Scripture, as might be expected, refers frequently to God’s Eternity. The very name “He Who is” implies the necessity of endless and ever-present existence. “I the Lord, I am the first and the last” (Isai. 41:4). “Grace be unto you and peace from Him that is, and that was, and that is to come” (Apoc. 1:4). “Before the mountains were made, or the earth and the world was formed; from eternity and unto eternity Thou art God” (Ps. 89:2, cf. Ecclus. 42:21). “Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham was made, I am” (John 8:58). “In the beginning, O Lord, thou didst found the earth, and the heavens are the work of Thy hands. They shall perish but Thou remainest; and all of them shall grow old like a garment; and as a vesture shalt Thou change them and they shall be changed. But Thou art always the self-same, and Thy years shall not fail” (Ps. 101:26–28). “A thousand years in Thy sight are as yesterday which is past” (Ps. 89:4). “One day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Pet. 3:8).

2. Among the Fathers St. Augustine should be especially consulted. “Eternal life,” he says, “surpasses temporal life by its very vivacity; nor can I perceive what eternity is except by the eye of my mind. For by that I exclude from eternity all change, and in eternity I perceive no portions of time, because these are made up of past and future movement. But in eternity nothing is past or future, because what is past has ceased to be, and what is future has not yet begun; whereas eternity only is,—not was, as though it were not still, not will be, as though it were not yet (‘Æternitas tantummodo est, nec fuit, quasi jam non sit, nec erit, quasi adhuc non sit’). Wherefore it alone can most truly say of itself: ‘I am who am;’ and of it alone can be said, ‘He Who is sent me to you’ “ (De Vera Relig., c. 49; see also In Psalm. cxxi., n. 6; Tract. in Joannem, xcix.).

II. God, in virtue of His Eternity, bears certain relations to time and to temporal events. His duration has no beginning, succession, or end, but it necessarily coexists with, precedes, and exceeds all real time. The Divine Eternity, having the simplicity of the Divine Essence and being only virtually extended, coexists in its entirety with every single moment of time, just as the central point of a circle coexists with all the points of the circumference. Hence temporal things have no successive duration in the eye of God; that is, in comparison with the Divine Eternity, they do not come and go, and pass by or along parts of it. In God’s sight they have neither past nor future, but are eternally present. Thus the points of a circumference in motion change their positions relatively to other points but always remain at the same distance from the centre. This, however, does not involve the eternal existence of events and things. Their eternal presence in God’s sight is owing, not to a duration coextensive with eternity on the part of creatures, but to the fact that the Divine Eternity encompasses and embraces all created duration, in the same way as the virtual extension of the Divine Substance encompasses and embraces all space. God sees and knows as actually standing before Him in His presence all things of all times, so that the Divine knowledge cannot rightly be called either memory or foreknowledge.

III. Eternity in the strict sense of the word belongs to God alone, and is the result of His independent and necessary mode of existence. Both reason and Scripture manifestly teach this. But it is not certain whether duration without beginning or end is incommunicable to creatures. Weighty theologians admit the possibility of a being created from all eternity; but it is of faith that no such being exists. Duration without end can of course be communicated to creatures, and will be the lot of all rational beings made according to God’s image and likeness. Nay, in a supernatural manner, God can elevate them even to a participation in the simplicity of His eternal Life, inasmuch as He grants them a life the object of which is His own eternal Substance, and which therefore participates in the simple immobility and uniformity of the Divine Life. Cf. St. Thomas, Contra Gentes, l. iii., c. 61.