Being
being
That which is capable of existence; its synonyms are thing, something. There are two uses of the term: the participial use (see existence), and the substantival, the definition of which is the one here given. The term being in the substantival sense is applicable to anything that either actually exists or can exist, for being is either actual, i.e., existent, or merely possible. It is contrasted with absolute nothingness, such as the impossible, e.g., a square circle, rather than with the merely non-existent. This term stands for the simplest of all our concepts, viz., the mere capacity for existence, and is the widest in application since it represents substances, accidents, modes of existence, God, and creature. Briefly whatever is not absolutely nothing is something or being.
Fuente: New Catholic Dictionary
Being
In early Greek philosophy is opposed either to change, or Becoming, or to Non-Being. According to Parmenides and his disciples of the Eleatic School, everything real belongs to the category of Being, as the only possible object of thought. Essentially the same reasoning applies also to material reality in which there is nothing but Being, one and continuous, all-inclusive and eternal. Consequently, he concluded, the coming into being and passing away constituting change are illusory, for that which is-not cannot be, and that which is cannot cease to be. In rejecting Eleitic monism, the materialists (Leukippus, Democritus) asserted that the very existence of things, their corporeal nature, insofar as it is subject to change and motion, necessarily presupposes the other than Being, that is, Non-Being, or Void. Thus, instead of regarding space as a continuum, they saw in it the very source of discontinuity and the foundation of the atomic structure of substance. Plato accepted the first part of Parmenides’ argument. namely, that referring to thought as distinct from matter, and maintained that, though Becoming is indeed an apparent characteristic of everything sensory, the true and ultimate reality, that of Ideas, is changeless and of the nature of Being. Aristotle achieved a compromise among all these notions and contended that, though Being, as the essence of things, is eternal in itself, nevertheless it manifests itself only in change, insofar as “ideas” or “forms” have no existence independent of, or transcendent to, the reality of things and minds. The medieval thinkers never revived the controversy as a whole, though at times they emphasized Being, as in Neo-Platonism, at times Becoming, as in Aristotelianism. With the rise of new interest in nature, beginning with F. Bacon, Hobbes and Locke, the problem grew once more in importance, especially to the rationalists, opponents of empiricism. Spinoza regarded change as a characteristic of modal existence and assumed in this connection a position distantly similar to that of Pinto. Hegel formed a new answer to the problem in declaring that nature, striving to exclude contradictions, has to “negate” themBeing and Non-Being are “moments” of the same cosmic process which, at its foundation, arises out of Being containing Non-Being within itself and leading, factually and logically, to their synthetic union in Becoming. — R.B.W.
In scholasticismThe English term translates three Latin terms which, in Scholasticism, have different significations. Ens as a noun is the most general and most simple predicate; as a participle it is an essential predicate only in regard to God in Whom existence and essence are one, or Whose essence implies existence. Esse, though used sometimes in a wider sense, usually means existence which is defined as the actus essendi, or the reality of some essence. Esse quid or essentia designates the specific nature of some being or thing, the “being thus” or the quiddity. Ens is divided into real and mental being (ens rationis). Though the latter also has properties, it is said to have essence only in an improper way. Another division is into actual and potential being. Ens is called the first of all concepts, in respect to ontology and to psychology; the latter statement of Aristotle appears to be confirmed by developmental psychology. Thing (res) and ens are synonymous, a res may be a res extra mentem or only rationis. Every ens issomething, i.e. has quiddity, one, true, i.e. corresponds to its proper nature, and good. These terms, naming aspects which are only virtually distinct from ens, are said to be convertible with ens and with each other. Ens is an analogical term, i.e. it is not predicated in the same manner of every kind of being, according to Aquinas. In Scotism ens, however, is considered as univocal and as applying to God in the same sense as to created beings, though they be distinguished as entia ab alto from God, the ens a se. See Act, Analogy, Potency, Transcendentals. — R.A.
In Spinoza’s sense, that which “is”, preeminently and without qualification — the source and ultimate subject of all distinctions. Being is thus divided into that which is “in itself” and “in another” (Ethica, I, Ax. 4; see also “substance” and “mode”, Defs. 3 and 5). Being is likewise distinguished with respect to “finite” and “infinite”, under the qualifications of absolute and relative, thus God is defined (Ibid, I, Def. 6) as “Being absolutely infinite”. Spinoza seems to suggest that the term, Being, has, in the strict sense, no proper definition (Cog. Met., I, 1). The main characteristics of Spinoza’s treatment of this notion are (i) his clear-headed separation of the problems of existence and Being, and (ii) his carefully worked out distinction between ens reale and ens rationis by means of which Spinoza endeavors to justify the ontological argument (q.v.) in the face of criticism by the later Scholastics. — W.S.W.
Fuente: The Dictionary of Philosophy
Being
* When not part of another verb (usually the participle), or part of a phrase, this word translates one of the following:
(a) the present participle of eimi, “to be,” the verb of ordinary existence;
(b) the participle of ginomai, “to become,” signifying origin or result;
(c) the present participle of huparcho, “to exist,” which always involves a preexistent state, prior to the fact referred to, and a continuance of the state after the fact. Thus in Phi 2:6, the phrase “who being (huparchon) in the form of God,” implies His preexistent Deity, previous to His birth, and His continued Deity afterwards.
In Act 17:28 the phrase “we have our being” represents the present tense of the verb to be, “we are.”