958. Hartshorne may be right that the meaning . . .

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Hartshorne may be right that the meaning of "the strictly categorial notions," like "relativity," "does not vary from one level to the other in the scale of beings" ("Tillich and the Other Great Tradition": 253). But the meaning of "relativity," at least, certainly does vary from the sense in which concretes may be said to be relative to that in which the same may be said of (ordinary) abstracts. Thus, as true as it may be that "both individuals and abstractions (other than those of uttermost generality) can have aspects of relativity, can depend in some way and degree upon contingent relations," there is nonetheless a difference in the way or degree in which individuals depend upon contingent relations and the way or degree in which abstractions are thus dependent.

To recognize this, however, is to obviate any need to distinguish confusingly, as Hartshorne does, between "almost categorial" and "strictly categorial" notions, the latter supposedly having "still wider applicability, or greater abstractness" than the former.

March 1998