Thomas Aquinas Commentary Colossians 1:15-17

"who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him were all things created, in the heavens and upon the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created through him, and unto him; and he is before all things, and in him all things consist." — Colossians 1:15-17 (ASV)

After Paul recalled for us the universal and special benefits of grace, he now commends the Author of this grace, who is Christ. He does this first in relation to God, second in relation to all creation (verse 15b), and third in relation to the Church (verse 18).

Regarding the first point, we should note that God is said to be invisible because He exceeds the visual capacity of any created intellect. No created intellect, by its natural knowledge, can attain His essence. As Job says, Behold, God is great, and we know him not (Job 36:26), and He dwells in unapproachable light (1 Timothy 6:16). Therefore, He is seen by the blessed through grace, not by their natural capacity. Dionysius gives the reason for this: all knowledge ends at something that exists, that is, at some nature that participates in the act of existence [esse]. But God is the very act of existence itself [ipsum esse]; He does not participate in existence but is the one in whom all things participate. Thus, He is not known in this way. It is of this invisible God that the Son is the image.

Let us now see how the Son is called the image of God, and why God is said to be invisible. The concept of an image includes three things:

1. An image must be a likeness.
2. It must be derived or drawn from the thing of which it is a likeness.
3. It must be derived with respect to something that pertains to the species (the essential nature) or to a sign of the species.

If two things are alike, but neither is derived from the other, then neither is the image of the other; for this reason, one egg is not said to be the image of another. Something is called an image because it imitates. Furthermore, if a likeness exists between two things but not according to their essential nature or a sign of it, we do not speak of an image. For example, a man has many accidental qualities, such as color and size, but these are not the reason for calling something an image of a man. But if something has the shape or figure of a man, then it can be called an image, because this shape is a sign of his species. The Son is like the Father, and the Father is like the Son. But because the Son has this likeness from the Father, and not the Father from the Son, we properly say that the Son is the image of the Father, and not the other way around, for this likeness is drawn and derived from the Father.

Furthermore, this likeness is according to their essential nature. In divine matters, the Son is represented, although faintly, by our concept of a "mental word." We form a mental word when we actually conceive the form of a thing we have knowledge of, and then we signify this mental word with an external, spoken word. This mental word we have conceived is a likeness of the thing in our mind, and it is like it in its essential nature. In this way, the Word of God is called the image of God.

Regarding our second question, we should note that the Arians misunderstood this text. They thought of the image of God as they did of the images they made of their ancestors, so they could see in these images the loved ones no longer with them (just as we make images of the saints to see in them those whom we cannot see in reality). They claimed that being invisible was unique to the Father and that the first visible reality was the Son, who manifested the Father's goodness. They were saying that the Father was truly invisible, but the Son was visible, and therefore their natures must be different. But the Apostle refutes this when he says: He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high (Hebrews 1:3). Thus, the Son is not only the image of the invisible God, but He Himself is invisible like the Father. He is the image of the invisible God.

Then, when he says, the first-born of all creation, he commends Christ in relation to creatures. He states this first and then expands on it (verse 16).

On the first point, we should note that the Arians understood this to mean that Christ is called the first-born because He is the first creature. But this is not the meaning, as will become clear. We must understand two things: how this image is generated, and in what way He is the first-born of creatures. Regarding the first, we should note that things generate in various ways depending on their nature and manner of existence; men generate in one way, plants in another, and so on. But the nature of God is His very existence [ipsum esse] and His act of understanding [intelligere]. Therefore, His generating or intellectual conceiving must be the generating or conceiving of His own nature. (In us, however, our intellectual conceiving is not the conceiving of our nature, because our nature is not the same as our act of understanding). Therefore, since this image is a word and concept of an intellect, it must be the offspring of the divine nature, so that the one receiving the nature from the other is necessarily generated.

Secondly, we must understand how the Son is called the first-born. God does not know Himself and creatures through two different sources; He knows all things in His own essence, as in the first efficient cause. The Son, however, is the intellectual concept or representation of God as He knows Himself, and consequently, as He knows every creature. Therefore, inasmuch as the Son is begotten, He is seen as a word representing every creature, and He is the principle of every creature. For if He were not begotten in that way, the Word of the Father would be the first-born of the Father only, and not of creatures: I came forth from the mouth of the Most High, the first-born before all creation [Vulgate].

Then, when he says, for in him all things were created, he explains what he has just said: that the Son is the first-born because He was generated as the principle of creatures. He does this with respect to three things: first, the creation of things; second, their distinction, in heaven and on earth; and third, their preservation in existence, for in him all things hold together.

He says that the Son is the first-born of every creature because He is generated or begotten as the principle of every creature. And so he says, for in him all things were created. In this regard, we should note that the Platonists affirmed the existence of Ideas, saying that each thing came to be by participating in an Idea, like the Idea of man or some other kind. Instead of all these, we have one: the Son, the Word of God. An artisan makes an artifact by having it participate in the form he has conceived within himself, enveloping it, so to speak, with external matter. We say that the artisan makes a house through the form of the thing which he has conceived within himself. In this way, God is said to make all things in His wisdom, because the wisdom of God relates to His created works just as the art of the builder relates to the house he has made. This form and wisdom is the Word; thus, in him all things were created, as in an exemplar. As Genesis says, He spoke, and they were made (Genesis 1), because He created all things to come into existence in His eternal Word.

With respect to the differences among things, we should note that some, like the Manicheans, were mistaken in thinking that earthly bodies, being corruptible, were made by an evil god, while the heavenly bodies, being incorruptible, were made by the good God, the Father of Christ. This was an error, because both types of bodies were created in the same Word. And so he says, in heaven and on earth. This difference is based on the different parts of corporeal nature. In the beginning—that is, in the Son—God created the heavens and the earth (Genesis 1:1).

The Platonists also said that God created invisible creatures, namely the angels, by Himself, but created bodily natures through the angels. But this is refuted here, because Paul says, visible and invisible. Regarding the first, he says: By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible (Hebrews 11:3). About the second we read: We have seen but a few of his works. For the Lord has made all things, and to the godly he has given wisdom . This difference in things is based on the nature of created things.

The third difference concerns the order and degrees found in invisible realities, when he says, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities. The Platonists were mistaken in this matter, for they said that different perfections are found in things and attributed each of these to its own first principle. They proposed an order of principles corresponding to the orders of these perfections. Thus they affirmed a first being, from whom all things participate in existence; another distinct principle, a first intellect, from which all things participate in intelligence; and then another principle, life, from which all things participate in life. But we do not agree with this, for all the perfections found in things are from one principle. Thus he says, whether thrones or dominions..., and so on, as if to say: they do not depend on an array of principles, but on the one unique Word of God.

Why does Paul say in his letter to the Ephesians, He has made him the head over all the Church (Ephesians 1:22)? He does not seem to be saying the same thing there as here. I reply that here Paul is giving a descending list of such beings, because he is showing the procession of creatures from God. But in Ephesians he gives an ascending list, because he is showing that the Son of God, as man, is above all creatures. In Ephesians, the principalities are placed under the authorities (or powers), and the virtues are between the dominions and authorities. But here in our text, the principalities are placed above the authorities, and between the dominions and the authorities. This is how the teaching of Gregory differs from that of Dionysius. Dionysius arranges the spiritual beings as they are in Ephesians, putting the dominions, virtues, and authorities in the second hierarchy. But Gregory arranges them as Paul does here, putting the dominions, principalities, and authorities in the second hierarchy, and the virtues, archangels, and angels in the third.

We should note, as Gregory and Dionysius say, that the spiritual gifts from which these different orders receive their names are common to all of them. Yet some orders receive their name from certain of these gifts, and others from different gifts. The reason for this can be seen from the teachings of the Platonists: whatever belongs to something belongs to it in one of three ways: essentially, by participation, or causally. A thing belongs essentially to another if it belongs to it in proportion to its nature; this is how being rational belongs to man. A thing belongs by participation if it surpasses the nature of the thing which has it, though the thing participates in it to a certain extent, albeit imperfectly; thus man is intellectual by participation, while being intellectual, which is superior to being rational, is in the angels essentially. A thing belongs to another causally if it accrues to it, as artifacts belong to a person; for they do not exist in him as in matter, but exist in his artistic power.

A thing is named only from what belongs to it essentially; thus we do not define man as an intellectual or artistic being, but as rational. Regarding the gifts present in the angels, those which belong to the higher angels essentially, belong to the lower ones by participation; and those which belong to the lower ones essentially, are present in the higher angels causally. Consequently, the higher angels receive their names from the higher gifts. The highest thing in a spiritual creature is that it attain to God and somehow participate in Him. Therefore, the higher angels receive their name because they attain God: seraphim, as being fervent or on fire with God; cherubim, as knowing God; and thrones, as having God seated in them.

One thing can participate in another in three ways: first, it can receive what is proper to the nature of what it is participating in; second, it can receive a thing insofar as it knows it; and third, it can serve the power of a thing. For example, a doctor participates in the art of medicine either because he possesses the art in himself, has received knowledge of the art, or serves the medical art. The first way of participating is greater than the second, and the second is greater than the third. In Sacred Scripture, what is divine is signified by fire: The Lord your God is a consuming fire (Deuteronomy 4:24). And so the highest order of angels is called the seraphim, as though on fire with God and having a divine property. The second order is the cherubim, who attain God by knowledge. The third are the thrones, who serve His power. The other orders are not named because they attain God, but because of some activity of God. Some angels direct or command; these are the dominions. Others accomplish what is commanded; the principal angels who do this are the principalities: The princes went before, joined with the singers (Psalms 68:25). Among the others who carry out commands, some act over spiritual creatures, such as the authorities (powers), who restrain evil spirits. If some act over natural things, they are called virtues, and these perform miracles. If they act over human beings, they are called archangels when concerned with great matters, and angels when concerned with lesser things. And so Paul concludes, all things were created through Him [per ipsum], as by an efficient cause, and in Him [in Thomas’ text], as in an exemplary cause: All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made (John 1:3).

Since someone might ask if all things are eternal, the Apostle answers: No! He is before all things, that is, before all time and all other things: The Lord possessed me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of old (Proverbs 8:22). Or, He is before all in dignity: For who in the skies can be compared to the Lord? (Psalms 89:6).

Regarding the preservation of things, he says, and in him all things hold together, that is, they are preserved. For God is to all things as the sun is to the moon, which loses its light when the sun departs. And so, if God were to withdraw His power from creation, all things would immediately cease to exist: upholding the universe by the word of his power (Hebrews 1:3).