God's Knowledge of the World

"Many articles have been published on the individual thinkers considered here, as well as important biographies and monographs on them and on their thought. But book-length considerations of the theory of divine ideas are rare, even for any of these thinkers individually. This book fills a gap in the scholarly literature and as such is significant. The bigger names will normally be considered – Bonaventure, Aquinas, Scotus and Ockham – but the supporting cast is not so often given attention."

~Vivian Boland, OP, Pontifical University of St. Thomas (Rome)

"Marked by meticulous scholarship and incisive argument, Vater's book provides the definitive systematic discussion of the divine ideas in the period from Aquinas to Ockham. It offers a vigorous and powerful defense of Scotus's approach against alternatives. The gauntlet is down!"

~Richard Cross, University of Notre Dame

"Vater’s treatment of divine ideas theory from Bonaventure to Ockham is a tour de force. This volume effectively explicates the general theory and also traces the details of its historical development through the High Scholastic period, focusing on all of the major figures as well as some of their lesser known students. In this way, this volume provides the reader with a better understanding of the metaphysical, epistemological, and logical debates of the Middle Ages. Vater's book will undoubtedly be of value to medievalists, philosophers, and theologians alike."

~Gregory T. Doolan, author of Aquinas on the Divine Ideas as Exemplar Causes

"Vater’s book is simply remarkable. He gives an overview of the problem of divine ideas in the major figures in thirteenth and early fourteenth century philosophy, but he also does much more than that. He provides a comprehensive taxonomy of the various theories, distinguishing between the imitability theory, the infinite intellect theory, obiectum cognitum theory, the creatura intellecta theory, and the nominalist theory. In the process, he covers the thought on divine ideas of Bonaventure, Aquinas, Henry of Ghent, Olivi, Petrus de Trabibus, James of Viterbo, Richard of Mediavilla, Scotus, some early Thomists and Scotists, Auriol, and Ockham. In each case, he locates a given thinker’s view of divine ideas in reference to their more general metaphysical and logical theories. For the taxonomy alone, the work would be worthwhile reading; for its actual treatment of the authors, it should be required reading for philosophers, theologians, and those working in intellectual history."

~Timothy B. Noone, The Catholic University of America

"Indeed, in this book Vater has put scholars of Scholastic philosophy and theology in his debt. The remarkable interpretive and expositional skill on display here will make his volume central to future discussions of the divine ideas. As Vivian Boland’s Ideas in God according to Saint Thomas admirably covered the late antique and early medieval developments leading up to Aquinas, so Vater’s book will now authoritatively conduct informed readers along the evolving sweep of this fascinating theological and philosophical tradition."

~Thomist

"Vater’s book is a rigorous yet luminously clear volume that narrates the medieval trajectories on divine ideas. This book will repay careful studying. Beyond the useful survey of the medieval trajectories on divine ideas, this book will help evangelicals in another way. In recent years Aquinas has been retrieved fruitfully within evangelical theology, but often in ways that isolate him as a normative or most important figure within the medieval period (in ways that ironically parallel the historically problematic centralization of Calvin for Reformed theology in the mid-twentieth century). For evangelical readers then, this volume will help to locate Aquinas within a larger whole, and to show that other thinkers, especially Bonaventure, may be an improvement over Aquinas in important respects."

~Evangelical Quarterly