dc.description | The argument of this thesis is to show how Books Five through Seven of St. Augustine's De Trinitate provide the necessary logic for predication of the trinitarian life of God. The argument is introduced with an account of the entire argument of Augustine's work so that the reader may more easily grasp the place of these middle books. Through the commentary on Books Five through Seven, the Aristotelian categories of substance, relation, and act, move the predication of the Trinity as the revealed content of Scripture away from its habitual and customary predication toward a coherent logical view of the divine essence and the divine persons. In the course of Books Five through Seven the mind of the reader, as well as the mind of the Church, is formed into a logical mirror, reflecting the substantial relative act of the Trinity. By virtue of this logical purgation and renovation, the mind is prepared to move through its categorical predication toward a concrete likeness of the Trinity. The argument of the thesis concludes with a proleptic view of how the newly formed logical image must give way to a participation of activity or union as the very similitude of God. | en_US |