Aristotle on Metaphysics(2004) - Bibotu.com

268 THE ULTIMATE CAUSE OF CHANGE: GODThe ultimate cause of change, God, is transcendent not because he ischangeless, non-material and intelligible, for that is also true of the formsthat are inseparable from changing, material things. He is transcendentbecause he is separable and perhaps even distinct, i.e. actually separated,from changing, material things and from nature as a whole. Thetranscendence of the ultimate cause of change is underlined when hesummarizes the conclusion of the argument for an ultimate cause ofchange (at the end of XII. 7): ‘thus it is evident from what has been saidthat there is an ousia that is everlasting and changeless and separate from senseperceptiblethings’ (1073 a 3–5). But it is also indicated when he states thateverything else depends on the ultimate cause of change: ‘on such aprinciple depends the heavens and [the whole of] nature’, i.e. the entiresense-perceptible and changing world (1072 b 13–14).So <strong>Aristotle</strong>’s metaphysics has the following structure:But he wants to distinguish his own commitment to changelesstranscendent beings from Plato’s. The main difference is that, whereas forPlato all changeless beings are transcendent, for <strong>Aristotle</strong> some changelessbeings are inseparable, namely, the forms of changing, material particulars.But even in <strong>Aristotle</strong> some changeless beings are transcendent, namely, itemerges, a single thing: the ultimate explanation and cause of change, God.But if we look closer, there is something in Plato which performs much thesame function as the ultimate cause of change in <strong>Aristotle</strong>, namely, theform of the good (Republic VI. 506bf.), which is the cause of rational,intelligible order and change in the universe (see also Timaeus 29dff.).Moreover, Plato appears to have singled out this form as pre-eminentlytranscendent when he says that it is even ‘beyond real being’ (epekeina tēsousias), i.e. beyond the plurality of the other forms (Republic 509b).<strong>Aristotle</strong> recognizes that the form of the good is Plato’s rival to his ownultimate cause of change, and he is at pains to point out the differencebetween the two conceptions of the pre-eminently transcendent being (seeespecially XII. 6, 1071 b 16–17). But the similarities are all the morestriking. For <strong>Aristotle</strong>’s God, like Plato’s form of the good, is ultimately