Movement - Immobility
“One of the two kinds of motion is direction. The other is alteration.” Plato
Movement
Motion is the spontaneous transfer of a being, object, or particle from one position to another. A moving object is one that, in relation to a stationary object, constantly changes position within a space. If, in a complete vacuum, two objects move at equal speeds and in parallel paths, their speed is not perceptible because one always sees the other in the same position. However, if we compare their paths with a cosmic object, near or far, or with the passage of a sunbeam within their kinetic space, then we can perceive and determine the speed at which they move through mathematical science.
The concept of motion exists in both the microcosm and the macrocosm.
In the microcosm, atoms, protons, neutrons, quarks, and elementary particles are subject to the laws of angular momentum, moving around themselves (spin) but also moving in a direction which, due to Werner Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, cannot be determined. The entire world of physical entities is in motion. From viruses to trees, animals, plants, magnetic waves, and sound waves, modern humans are able to measure their movements in mathematical terms.
On the large scale of the universe, the science of spectroscopy allows humans to approach with almost complete accuracy the motion and trajectory of planetary systems and galaxies. The principle of motion is a universal law to which all beings and phenomena of nature and the world are subject. The Kinetic Principle and the Law of Motion are described with mathematical precision in Einstein’s Special and General Theory of Relativity. However, Aristotle, with his own philosophical-scientific interpretation, teaches that motion is a phenomenon of the parts of a complete Whole called Rest.
Immobility
The “being” in the original sense of “becoming,” according to Aristotle, has two primary elements: matter as the subject and the form that defines it. Matter is as unborn as form. Both are eternal. However, that which is born, that which becomes, is neither matter nor form. Genesis, that which is called “becoming,” is created by the specific connection between matter and form, which concerns the transition from a possibility to a reality.
Motion is spontaneous and eternal. The first cause of motion is also eternal. This first cause of the Kinetic Principle, which no material thing can approach, is the Absolute Spirit, the Divinity, according to Aristotle. The question that arises is “does Divinity move?” If movement is the result of the creation of the world, is Divinity subject to the need to move? Because, if it is, then Necessity precedes Divinity.
However, since Necessity arises from the Essence of Divinity, then Divinity is a completely Immobile Divine Essence, the One, the Unique, the Unborn, the Eternal, the Unchanging, the Complete, the Full, the Indivisible but at the same time Indivisible. When the One is divided into Two, immobility gives birth to movement. Everything that moves is defined into two kinds, into genera, into chemical patterns and substances, creating nature and the world. And while the Immovable Substance, the Divinity, contemplates only Itself outside of any material existence, Its generative Substance, the Two, creates the eternal “becoming,” that which always was and always will be, reproducing species and genera ad infinitum.
Conclusion: The ultimate purpose of the intelligent existence called Man is to know “after death” the kinetic world of the Other Life, with the aim of uniting the soul with the Divine.