Aristotle deemed it necessary to introduce the idea of a Prime Mover into his Metaphysics. In doing so, he had no other motive than to follow the logic of his reasoning, focusing on the idea of « movement », an idea that is also primary when taken in all its general meanings. However, this Aristotelian God, abstract and purely conceptual, was hardly compatible with the pursuit of strictly religious ends. He might seem, for example, rather unsuited to popular devotional practices, such as those observed towards a ‘personal’ or ‘tribal’ God, or towards a deity who is certainly not abstract and who intervenes more or less indiscriminately in the history of the world and humanity. Nevertheless, the philosopher’s invention of a « Prime Mover » represented a significant step in the history of rational rather than mythological thought. The expression « Prime Mover » also reveals the importance of the idea of movement in Aristotelian physics, which involved various kinds of « movers » and a multiplicity of « moved » things. The initial cause of (general) Movement could not itself be « mobile », otherwise there would be infinite regression. The first cause is therefore immobile. It is this cause that is called the « Prime Mover », « eternal », « immobile », « intelligible » and « separate » from all (mobile) beingsⁱ. Today, Aristotelian physics and cosmology are outdated, but the metaphysical problem they implied continues to arise, since it has still not been resolved. It is not that there has been a lack of attempts to resolve it. For example, instead of Aristotle’s Prime Mover God, a God has been proposed who would be the abstract principle of the universe, a transcendent principle of Creation. But the gain is minimal. The process of the concrete creation of the universe would not be limited to an initial impulse; it could be considered potentially infinite. Another idea: the current state of the universe, as well as all the things it contains, are in an essential and permanent relationship with unfathomable fields of future possibilities, which are themselves infinite. In other interpretations, eternal or pre-eternal ideas generate « models » capable of giving some reality to all kinds of beings, all kinds of existing things, and all varieties of continual differentiations. Each particular thing, each singular event, each specific circumstance, then represents a current opportunity to (temporarily) limit the infinite field of possibilitiesⁱⁱ. It is by virtue of these series of limitations that the particular value of the unity of the world emerges at every moment, as it represents a provisional totality, before opening up again, the next moment, to other fields of possibility. All circumstantial coincidences, all specific cases, must be considered as bearers of new virtualities, charged with the potential for other opportunities, themselves unique, singular, and potentially real insofar as they are realised. Reality is thus constantly being formed within the total unity of all real occasions and all the virtual potentialities to which they give rise. In this context, every opportunity represents a unique configuration of possibilities effectively brought together in concrete reality, thereby opening up prospects for new local paths within the global state of the world. To give an example, let us consider a singular occasionⁱⁱⁱ, which I will designate here by the ancient Greek letter Ϡ, pronounced « sampi ». I have chosen this letter to fix the ideas, and because it evokes a kind of bent (and thinking) reed, from which two kinds of sprouts, grafts, diverticula or rootlets seem to emerge. Once the occasion Ϡ « exists », we must also take into account other current occasions associated with the configuration of possibilities that allowed Ϡ to exist. All these other occasions, through their possible relationships with Ϡ, participate in the very essence of Ϡ. What Ϡ is in itself is a unit of experience that has actually been realised; therefore, it is legitimate to ask how other occasions participate in the experience that Ϡ represents. A partial answer to this question is that the relations between all actual occasions are at least as unfathomable and innumerable in their variety as those that connect the eternal ideas and patterns mentioned above, which are confined to the realm of abstraction. There are undoubtedly fundamental types of relations that would make it possible to describe the whole variety of relations between ideas, patterns and occasions. To understand the types of participation of a certain current occasion in the essence of other potential occasions, it would theoretically be necessary to be able to classify all spatio-temporal relationships, their modalities and their categorical determinations. This is a difficult, even infinite task, given how different all kinds of past, present and future events are. For example, the hypothesis of a perfect equivalence of the very notion of « event » before the Big Bang, during it, or even some time after it, has no metaphysical justification. The very structure of space-time, as well as that of causality, could change completely, without any metaphysical reason, but solely by contingency or chance. A real occasion Ϡ always presents itself as a unique process; it has an infinitely ramified past and presents itself as an infinitely potential becoming. By revealing itself in its singularity, Ϡ takes its place among a multiplicity of other occasions, without which it could not be what it is. It defines itself as an individual and particular realisation, concentrating in its own limited way the unlimited domain that consists of eternal ideas, concrete objects and an infinity of other occasions, which, through their independent determinations, have allowed Ϡ to come into reality. Every occasion Ϡ comes from other occasions that collectively form its past. It presents itself, and to itself, as being constituted, in large part, by all the occasions that collectively constellate its present. It is in relation to this immense past that it presents itself to itself and to the world, in an immediate present, and that it finds the taste of its own originality. This presentation of Ϡ to itself, this bringing of Ϡ into its own effective reality, constitutes its unique contribution to the production of all current reality. It may be partly conditioned, or even completely determined, by the past from which it originates. But its presentation, in the present tense and under such and such conditions, is what immediately emerges from its direct engagement with reality. The occasion Ϡ is therefore partly constituted by this actuality, but it also contains within itself an indeterminacy, always in potential, in the form of future developments, possible, eventual or improbable, but which cannot be excluded a priori. This potential future is partially determined because it germinates within Ϡ and is also in a spatio-temporal relationship with all other occasions that have already been actualised and belong to the past and present of Ϡ. From another point of view, this possible future, this conceivable future, represents a putative synthesis, in Ϡ, of eternal ideas that find, at a given moment, the opportunity to migrate out of the other countless occasions realised in the past, to now enter into this occasion, Ϡ. They also hope, perhaps, to move on from this one to other occasions and other individualisations to come. By observing, if it were possible, all these intricacies and multiplicities, most of which are totally improbable and perfectly unpredictable, one could theoretically meditate on how « being » can emerge from « non-being », the real from the virtual. Thus, in every occasion Ϡ, there is a partial, provisional, unexpected, unanticipated but very real realisation of eternal ideas and abstract models, mixed with myriad concrete circumstances. This a priori unpredictable realisation represents a kind of raw, even abrupt synthesis of eternal ideas, temporary objects, natural sequences and exceptional circumstances. However raw and abrupt it may be, this sudden synthesis itself presents multiple gradations that limit it in its relationship to reality. These limitations find their source in the metaphysical limitation that is consubstantial with every occasion. Each occasion captures in the synthesis it embodies, at a given moment, something of the way in which all actuality includes the virtual elements necessary for its realisation. This capture can also include all kinds of contingencies and errors, but also inventions, discoveries and new angles of truth, fuelling future and necessary re-foundations of sciences, philosophies and religions. Through this grasp, every reality is confronted in each occasion with the potential power of all its alternatives. The occasion is defined as a process heralding a new unity of experience, a new synthesis, which superimposes a real and unique substance (such as a ‘body’, a ‘mind’, or a ‘soul’) and the potential sum of other syntheses to come, based on new experiences. The unity of all current occasions makes it impossible to consider the absolute independence of all substances as probable. They are all intertwined, they are all mixed up with all past and present occasions, and, at least virtually, with all future occasions. Each individual activity of a given substance is nothing more than a certain mode of individualisation and integration of all the conditions imposed, permanently, on all occasions. The general activity of substances forms a kind of « unified totality » which is not itself a substance. Activity is not an entity in the sense that fleeting occasions or eternal ideas are entities. On the other hand, it possesses a certain metaphysical character, under which all occasions are subsumed, each according to a singular mode specific to each occasion. There is nothing to which this « general activity » can be compared. It could perhaps be likened to a kind of conatus, taken in a broader sense, much more general than the one Spinoza gives to this word, and which would be understood as a permanent, eternal, multi-directional effort, an effort not only to persevere in one’s being, but above all to persevere in the search for one’s becoming, a becoming that must reveal itself as other than the current being. Thus, this eternal possibility of a becoming attached to every occasion Ϡ , and its differentiation into new singular multiplicities, are two of the attributes that constitute the substance of the « unified totality » at every moment. The whole is indeed « unified » but it is also always « unfinished »; it is always in the process of becoming, and all the circumstances and occasions that constitute its substance are currently limited in their own time and space, even if their potentialities remain open to countless fields of probability. These limitations take three forms. On the one hand, there are the logical and structural relationships to which all events and occasions must conform. On the other hand, we must take into account the selection of relationships to which events specifically conform. Finally, there are the limitations due to the particularities and singularities that affect the very expression of these relationships of logic and causality. Not all of these kinds of limitations are negative; they produce value. It is these limitations that make it possible to move from power to action, from the virtual to the potential. Moreover, the value associated with reality depends on a number of prior norms, which govern in advance the acceptance or rejection of such circumstances and modalities. The principle of limitation is necessary as a means of particularisation, specification and individuation of circumstances, so that the occasion Ϡ « transcends » all past potentialities and virtualities and takes on a new and very real form. As for the very essence of limitation, no reason or explanation can be given, because reason itself is made up of limitations, and these limitations stem from all of previous history. Reason has in fact been forged gradually as a result of countless limitations encountered and overcome throughout the ages. And no essential reason can be given for the existence of limitations linked to circumstances, or for their profound nature. Similarly, no reason can be given for the nature of Divinity itself, or for its absence or silence, or even for the general order of the world. One can only say that the nature of Divinity, whatever it may be, could be the distant foundation of all that exists, and in particular of some hypothetical rationality that is supposed to justify existence, even the most singular forms of it. Divinity is never concrete in itself, even if we can hypothesise that it represents an essential factor in the concretisation of reality, and even more so in the foundation of the movement of the world. What is metaphysically indeterminate by nature must nevertheless be conceptually determinable and, in principle, categorically distinguishable. By observing the nature of things and the evolution of the universe, it is always possible, again in principle, to conceive of all the limits of rationality. For there is a limitation inherent in all categories of being, and in particular a limitation specific to beings of ‘nature’, which does not derive from any a priori metaphysical reason, but which seems to be immanent in them. There is undoubtedly a metaphysical need to posit the existence of a very general principle of determination of being and beings, but there can be no metaphysical reason for determining concretely to what and how this principle applies, in what circumstances and for what purposes. In short, it is impossible to determine (metaphysically) how what could be determined should be determined, and how what should not be determined can escape it. If such a (metaphysical) reason existed, no other principle would be necessary because, with metaphysics having absolute primacy, everything would be intrinsically determined, forever and ever, and the universe would be nothing more than a kind of mechanism, highly sophisticated, extremely precise, extremely diverse, but deprived of all (metaphysical) freedom. Moreover, even the general principle of empiricism is based on the doctrine that there is a principle of reality, a principle of autonomy of concrete things, which cannot be discovered by abstract reason, but can only be observed through experience. What can be known in the world of concrete things must be sought through specific experiments and is therefore based only on empirical foundations, not on rational, abstract ones. Of course, after the fact, it is always possible to attempt rational syntheses based on the empirical results of experiments and observations of ‘reality’, at least of that reality which can be seen and observed. But who can say anything about what ‘reality’ hides within itself and does not always choose to reveal? Moreover, when it comes to interpreting the results of experiments, humanity has always been deeply divided throughout history. For example, the interpretation of the very existence of the world, which is part of the primary experience of every existing being, has depended heavily on different eras, cultures and languages. Thus, the Divinity, which according to certain interpretations is the very principle of the existence of this world, has been given different names at different times, in different contexts and according to various theological and philosophical views: First Cause, Supreme Being, Brahman, Brahmā, Prajāpati, Chaos, Cosmos, Chance, Elohim, YHVH, Heavenly Father, Allah, etc. Each of these names corresponds to a system of thought derived from the experiences of those who used it. They therefore all have a particular meaning that can only be understood by taking into account all the circumstances that led to the establishment of the human environment that made them possible. These names, moreover, are of only relative importance. More important is to discern whether a particular name carries with it the responsibility for the origin of all Evil, and allows us to identify the nature of its relationship with Good^iv. If the Divinity is recognised as the supreme foundation of the world and all its limitations, then it would be in its nature to separate Good from Evil and establish Reason as the supreme judge. If, on the other hand, we do not want to recognise it as having any responsibility for the creation of Evil, then we must definitely push our thinking far beyond common sense and venture into another order of thought, where neither Good nor Evil can retain the usual meaning they have come to acquire on this Earth, after a few thousand years of rather fleeting civilisations, with no real prospects except the more or less desperate ones of trying to prolong themselves a little longer.

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iAristotle. Metaphysics. Book XII, ch. 7. « We must conceive of something that moves without being moved, something eternal, which is substance and which is act. Now, this is how it moves: it is like the desirable and the intelligible, which moves without being moved. On both sides, for the intelligible and the desirable, the primitives are the same. The desired object is what seems good to us; and the primitive of the will is the good itself. We desire it because it seems desirable to us, rather than it seems desirable to us because we desire it; for in this, it is intelligence that is the principle. Now, intelligence is moved only by the intelligible […] The foregoing suffices to demonstrate the existence of an eternal, immobile substance, separate from all other beings that our senses can perceive. « 

iiRegarding the metaphysics of « limitation », see the article in this blog, Freedom, Kenosis and Tsimtsoum, and in particular this excerpt: « Contingency, chance and fortune contradict the supposed manifestations of divine omnipotence and omniscience. They mark the necessary limits of necessity; the necessary limits of divine power, knowledge and will. Contingency (contingentia) breaks the chain of necessity (necessitas) without reason. It limits the power of causes, denies the tyranny of determinism, and breaks the inflexible chain of causality. Chance (casus) thwarts fate (fatum), it ‘contradicts’ everything that has been ‘predicted’ or ‘declared’. In doing so, it invalidates all prescience. Fortune (fortuna) thwarts universal harmony (harmonia). It thwarts the order of the world and the will that animates it. Contingency, chance and fortune represent as many limits to the « omnipotence » of necessity and fate, and as many possible openings to « freedom ». See also, for further discussion: Philippe Quéau. La Fin du monde commun. 2016

iiiI borrow this term to A.N. Whitehead. Science and the Modern World. The Lowell Lectures. Chapter XI, « God ». 1925, p. 217

ivRare are the formulas that attribute the very origin of evil to God, as the prophet Isaiah does not hesitate to do: עֹשֶׂה שָׁלוֹם וּבוֹרֵא רָע , « I make peace and I create evil » (Is 45:7).