Space, accordingly, is not a form of perception (Kant), but a mode of existence characteristic of
all created beings. Even less true is the idea that space is a form of external perception, while time
is a form of internal perception, so that the idea of space would apply only to the physical universe,
and that of time only to the spiritual or intellectual world. On the contrary, both time and space
are internal modes of existence characteristic of all finite beings. From this it follows, however,
that neither space nor time can be predicated of God, the infinite One. He transcends all space
and location. Philo and Plotinus already spoke along these lines,75 and Christian theology
likewise stated that God “contains all things and he alone is uncontained.”76 In his Manichaean
days Augustine believed that, like a fine ether, God was spread throughout endless space in every
direction.77 But later he learned to see things differently. God transcends all space and location.
He is not “somewhere,” yet he fills heaven and earth. He is not spread throughout space, like light
and air, but is present with his whole being in all places: “whole and entire in every place but
confined to none.”78 There is no place or space that contains him; hence, instead of saying that he
is in all things, it would be better to say that all things are in him. Yet this is not to be understood
to mean that he is the space in which things are located, for he is not a place. Just as the soul in its
entirety is present in the body as a whole and in every part of it, and just as one and the same truth
is acknowledged everywhere, so also, by way of analogy, God is in all things and all things are in
God.79 And these thoughts of Augustine surface again later in the works of the scholastics.80
Catholic and Protestant theologians have not added anything essentially new.81
Of course, neither space nor location can be predicated of God. Space is a form of existence
characteristic of finite beings. Immensity pertains to God alone and not to any creature, not even
to the human nature of Christ. Implied in it, first of all, is that God infinitely transcends all space
and location. “God is uniquely a place of his own to himself.”82 “Within his very self he is wholly
everywhere.” In that sense it can be equally well said of God that he is nowhere and somewhere
(Philo, Plotinus), for the idea of a specific location does not apply to him. The term omnipresence,
however, does not in the first place express this being of God within himself, but especially
denotes the specific relation of God to the space that was created along with the world. Here, too,
of course, we can only speak of God in creational terms. Scripture even refers to God’s going,
coming, walking, and coming down. It employs human language, the kind of language to which
we too are bound. “To discover where he is, is hard; to discover where he is not, is even harder.”83
It is therefore a good thing in connection with each attribute to remind ourselves that we are
speaking of God in human terms.84 It is precisely the realization that God cannot be measured
by time or space—even if this is purely negative—that keeps us from depriving God of his
transcendence over all creatures. Again, in the negation lies a strong affirmation. God’s relation to
space cannot consist in the notion that he is in space and is enclosed by it, in the manner in which,
in Greek mythology, Uranos and Chronos were powers over Zeus. For God is not a creature. “If
he were confined to a particular place, he would not be God.”85 He is neither a body extended
throughout space and “circumscriptively” present in space, nor is he a finite created spirit
permanently bound to a specific location, and therefore “definedly” present in space. Nor can the
relation be such that space is within him and bounded by him as the larger unbounded space, as
some in the past conceived of God when they called him “the spatial container (
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