Jaarboek Thomas Instituut 1989 - Thomas Instituut te Utrecht

22 Peter van Veldhuijsen
SUMMARY
One of the Earliest Disciples of Thomas Aquinas, Hannibaldus de
Hannibaldis, On the Impossibility of an Etemally Created World
Concerning the question of the eternity of the world, it appears
that Hannibaldus de Hannibaldis, when he answers the problem
'Utrum creaturarum universitas, quae mundi nomine nuncupatur,
sit Deo coaeterna,' in a twofold respect does not follow his master
Thomas Aquinas. He even contradicts Aquinas' opinion, which says
that, philosophically speaking, creaiio ab aeierno is a possible position.
In the first place, Hannibaldus thinks that creation "in the beginning"
can be proved with demonstrative force. Being created
means, according to him, that the creature has received being after
not being, in the strict durational sense of esse post non esse. Inthe
second place, it follows then logically from this precise meaning of
creation that an eternally created world could not have been made
by God.
It is interesting that Hannibaldus' conception recalls to mind the
view of Bonaventure on creation and the impossibility of an eternally
created world, a view which Thomas Aquinas had criticized so
sharply.
Hannibaldus' scientific work - we only know that he wrote a
commentary on the Sentences - is incorporated in Thomas Aquinas,
Opera omnia, ed. Vivès, Parisiis, 1878, vol. 30.