In the Beginning and End is the Weird

We're still toying with the idea that Being could be a derivation of something deeper or higher, i.e., Beyond Being, or whether this constitutes a contradiction -- or possibly just a nominal difference (basically a name for the unknown and unknowable God of orthodox apophatic theology, not a separate reality). 

Garrigou-Lagrange writes that "The attributes which relate to God's very being" first include unity, truth, and "goodness or perfection." Next comes "infinity which excludes any limitation of essence," then  "immensity and omnipresence which exclude spatial limitation," and "eternity which excludes all time limitation." 

It is unclear from the context why he seems to place infinitude in a second tier of attributes, as if to imply that it is derived from one of the top three (unity, truth, goodness). Either way, when he says that infinitude "excludes any limitation of essence," he means that every being is composed of essence and existence, whereas only in God -- AKA necessary being -- are essence and existence one, in that God's essence is to exist.

Here again, what could be higher than necessary and self-subsisting being? If it is necessary, then it cannot be a possibility, virtuality, or entailment of something else. Nor is there any division in being, neither within itself nor from something else. Rather, the only thing from which it would be divided is non-being, or nothing, which cannot be. 

Again, from the standpoint of apophatic theology, God is of course nothing, but that is due simply to the limitations of finite language to comprehend infinitude. It doesn't necessarily imply a God beyond God, since -- in a manner of speaking, God (in reality) is always and already beyond God (as we conceive him). 

Let's review our cosmic flow chart from a couple posts ago:

Again, we see that the divine essence and supra-personal God is situated above the personal, who is part of relativity and maya. 

However, G-L writes that the "attributes thus derived from Being itself enable us to say of God that He is personal," which is the principle of our own consciousness, intelligence, and liberty. 

Okay, but what's He like, beyond the abstract attributes? This will take us into trinitarian theology, which is over 100 pages into the future. Suffice it to say, Necessary Being turns out to be relative after all, not to Beyond Being, but within itself, nor does this relation "posit in God an evident imperfection." 

Now interestingly, here is some convergence with Schuon, who often speaks of the intellect which is both uncreated and uncreatable. Likewise, G-L writes that  "The human intellect is not merely human, it is also an intellect." And "Inasmuch as it is an intellect, its object, like that of every intellect, is Being itself."

We might say that God is the eternal intellection of his own Being, only in an undivided manner; conversely, for us there is always a partition between being and knowing. Some would say the partition is erased in nondual realization of the divine essence, but I would be content with the beatific vision, which amounts to the same thing, only with me still there to enjoy it. Different yokes for different folks.

Being itself is uncaused; but again, a glance at the chart suggests that Being is in fact caused by Beyond Being. Is this coherent? In a way, yes, in the sense that Being itself is already "without limitations" and "incomprehensible." It is already infinite, and "nothing can be added to the infinite." 

Therefore Infinite Being + Beyond Being doesn't seem to add anything to the equation: "infinity plus one is still infinity." Divine Being is "completely present to itself in one permanent instant." 

Still, I wonder if the revelation of the Trinity helps us to handle some of the same metaphysical problems which the positing of Beyond Being is intended to resolve, so let's flip on ahead to the section covering this, and see if we can reconcile these two perspectives.

First of all, "Reason alone suffices to make known to us God's existence and His principle attributes." And 

It would seem that an infinite being must have infinite fecundity, which cannot but be manifested by the creation of beings that are necessarily finite.... He generates because of the superabundance of his infinite fecundity.

But

Even before God had created, it would have been true to say of Him, that the divine goodness is infinitely communicative.

"Revelation tells us"

that in God there is an eternal and unique Word, generated once and forever by the divine intellect of the Father.

In an analogous way, this could correspond to the antinomy of Beyond Being and Being, in that

The Father's intellect sees in the Word the final answer to the problems that philosophy and theology do not even succeed in positing.

This is a kind of supreme intersubjectivity that grounds our own personal intersubjectivity, both horizontally (with other persons) and vertically (with God), for the very life of the Godhead "is not one of solitude but of communicativeness in the highest degree."

Our own spiritual birth "bears a faint resemblance to the eternal generation of the Son," and "is in its supernatural reality a reflection of the sonship of the Word." 

Which is plenty weird enough for me, since it is always already way beyond my own being.