Scientia Media

Molinism, formerly an invective, is nowadays a topic of philosophy. This book, however, does not deal with the modern renaissance of Middle Knowledge, rather, it explores its proliferation during the 17th and 18th centuries. The focus shifts from reviewing current trends in Church History to rehearsing the metaphysics that backed up Middle Knowledge.Fact, in Molinism, is threefold: It could have been otherwise, it belongs to some possible world, it is necessarily known by the Omniscient. Whereas the classical account of God’s foreknowledge rests on its being postvolitional, the Molinist qualification of this account denies that it applies to the counterfactuals. On what else then does it prevolitionally depend that God knows for sure something to happen rather than not to happen?The Salmantine Treatise on God’s foreknowledge edited here provides some additional piece of evidence of a deep Molinist disagreement. Though the manuscript was ready for print in 1653, this business failed and the manuscript fell into oblivion along with its author. The Jesuit Luke Wadding (1593-1651) belongs to a number of men from Waterford who at a time, when intolerance forced Catholics into large scale emigration, hopefully turned towards Spain. He must not be confounded with his famous namesake, the Franciscan friar, who was his cousin.Molinism, formerly an invective, is nowadays a topic of philosophy. This book, however, does not deal with the modern renaissance of Middle Knowledge, rather, it explores its proliferation during the 17th and 18th centuries. The focus shifts from reviewing current trends in Church History to rehearsing the metaphysics that backed up Middle Knowledge.Fact, in Molinism, is threefold: It could have been otherwise, it belongs to some possible world, it is necessarily known by the Omniscient. Whereas the classical account of God’s foreknowledge rests on its being postvolitional, the Molinist qualification of this account denies that it applies to the counterfactuals. On what else then does it prevolitionally depend that God knows for sure something to happen rather than not to happen?The Salmantine Treatise on God’s foreknowledge edited here provides some additional piece of evidence of a deep Molinist disagreement. Though the manuscript was ready for print in 1653, this business failed and the manuscript fell into oblivion along with its author. The Jesuit Luke Wadding (1593-1651) belongs to a number of men from Waterford who at a time, when intolerance forced Catholics into large scale emigration, hopefully turned towards Spain. He must not be confounded with his famous namesake, the Franciscan friar, who was his cousin.

Published

Molinismus ist heute ein Kapitel Philosophie. Das Thema dieses Buchs ist jedoch nicht die Renaissance der Scientia Media-Hypothese in der modernen angloamerikanischen Religionsphilosophie, sondern ihre scholastische Ausgestaltung in dem auf Molina folgenden Jahrhundert: Ohne den Kalkül mit den möglichen Welten z.B. kein Leibniz mit seinem Optimismus. Die vorliegende Studie bahnt sich den Weg durch die Gnadenstreitigkeiten zur Metaphysik des Faktenwissens. Hier zeigt sich die Grundlagenkrise des Molinismus. Das molinistische Faktum hat drei Merkmale: Es ist kontingent, es ist Teil einer möglichen Welt, es ist vom Allwissenden notwendig gewußt. Traditionell beruht die Lehre von Gottes Faktenwissen auf dem Dogma vom Vorsprung der göttlichen Willensaktivität. Dieses Dogma ist durch die Scientia Media-Hypothese erschüttert. Worauf beruht es aber dann, daß Gott A vorherweiß, nicht nonA? Der Streit der Schulrichtungen wird zusätzlich durch eine lateinische Textedition illustriert. Von dem Jesuiten Luke Wadding (1593-1651), dem Autor dieses schwierigen Texts, ist bisher nur bekannt, daß er der Lehrer des Scientia Media-Historikers Gabriel de Henao gewesen ist.