Participated Eternity in the Vision God: A Study of the Opinion of Thomas Aquinas and His Commentators on the Duration of the Acts of Glory

Frequently the New Testament and documents of the Magisterium refer to the Beatific vision with the term Life everlasting - Vita Aeterna. This may at first seem somewhat strange, especially to the philosopher who considers naturally certain the human soul's capacity for endless existence. How was a term which suggests so natural a meaning selected to designate the knowledge and love of the Father, who is inaccessible to man save through the Son's revelation? Is this not a rather inept way to denote so supernatural an operation? Certainly the eternal life demonstrated by the light of reason involves no such transcendent perfection. This is not research on the history of a meaningless subtlety. Its rather an attempt to throw light on another aspect of man's feeble but continuing efforts after revelation to understand in some way the mystery of his deification in the Vision of God. For the present question attempts were made over a period of four hundred years and form part of the theological heritage of the Church.