Sophie's World

by Jostein Gaarder

According to Aquinas, there was a progressive degree of existence from plants and animals to man, from man to angels, and from angels to God. Man, like animals, has a body and sensory organs, but man also has intelligence which enables him to reason things out. Angels have no such body with sensory organs, which is why they have spontaneous and immediate intelligence. They have no need to “ponder,” like humans; they have no need to reason out conclusions. They know everything that man can know without having to learn it step by step like us. And since angels have no body, they can never die. They are not everlasting like God, because they were once created by God. But they have no body that they must one day depart from, and so they will never die.’ ‘That sounds lovely!’ ‘But up above the angels, God rules, Sophie. He can see and know everything in one single coherent vision.’ ‘So he can see us now.’ ‘Yes, perhaps he can. But not “now.” For God, time does not exist as it does for us. Our “now” is not God’s “now.” Because many weeks pass for us, they do not necessarily pass for God.’