et Vetera Nova Winter 2022 • Volume 20, Number 1 The English Edition of the International Theological Journal Co-Editors Matthew Levering, Mundelein Seminary Thomas Joseph White, O.P., Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas Associate Editors Holly Taylor Coolman, Providence College Gilles Emery, O.P., University of Fribourg Paul Gondreau, Providence College Scott W. Hahn, Franciscan University of Steubenville Thomas S. Hibbs, Baylor University Reinhard Hütter, Catholic University of America Christopher Malloy, University of Dallas Bruce D. Marshall, Southern Methodist University Charles Morerod, O.P., Bishop of Lausanne, Geneva, and Fribourg John O’Callaghan, University of Notre Dame Chad C. Pecknold, Catholic University of America Michael S. Sherwin, O.P., University of Fribourg Board of Advisors Anthony Akinwale, O.P., Dominican Institute, Ibadan, Nigeria Khaled Anatolios, University of Notre Dame Robert Barron, Auxiliary Bishop of Los Angeles, CA John Betz, University of Notre Dame Bernhard Blankenhorn, O.P., Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas Christopher O. Blum, Catholic University of America Stephen Brock, Pontifical University of the Holy Cross Peter Casarella, Duke University Divinity School Boyd Taylor Coolman, Boston College Michael Dauphinais, Ave Maria University Archbishop J. Augustine Di Noia, O.P., Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Douglas Farrow, McGill University Anthony Fisher, O.P., Archbishop of Sydney, Australia Simon Francis Gaine, O.P., Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas Timothy Gray, Augustine Institute Nicholas J. Healy, Jr., Pontifical John Paul II Institute (Washington, DC) Russell Hittinger, University of Tulsa Paige Hochschild, Mount St. Mary’s University Andrew Hofer, O.P., Dominican House of Studies Dominic Legge, O.P., Dominican House of Studies Joseph Lienhard, S.J., Fordham University Steven A. Long, Ave Maria University Guy Mansini, O.S.B., Ave Maria University Francesca Aran Murphy, University of Notre Dame Thomas Osborne, University of St. Thomas (Houston) Michał Paluch, O.P., Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas Trent Pomplun, University of Notre Dame Christopher J. Ruddy, Catholic University of America Richard Schenk, O.P., University of Freiburg Michele Schumacher, University of Fribourg Janet Smith, Sacred Heart Major Seminary Christopher Thompson, St. Paul Seminary Thomas Weinandy, O.F.M. Cap., Capuchin College William Wright, Duquesne University Instructions for Contributors 1. Address all contributions, books for review, and related correspondence to Matthew Levering, mjlevering@yahoo.com. 2. Contributions should be prepared to accord as closely as possible with the typographical conventions of Nova et Vetera. The University of Chicago Manual of Style (16th edition) is our authority on matters of style. 3. Nova et Vetera practices blind review. Submissions are evaluated anonymously by members of the editorial board and other scholars with appropriate expertise. Name, affiliation, and contact information should be included on a separate page apart from the submission. 4. Galley-proofs of articles are sent to contributors to be read and corrected and should be returned to the Editors within ten days of receipt. Corrections should be confined to typographical and factual errors. 5. Submission of a manuscript entails the author’s agreement (in the event his or her contribution is accepted for publication) to assign the copyright to Nova et Vetera. Nova et Vetera The English Edition of the International Theological Journal ISSN 1542-7315 Winter 2022 Vol. 20, No. 1 Tract for the Times Tract for the Times 1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Anonymous 1 Commentary St. Thomas and the “Good News” of Punishment?. . . . . . . . . . Basil Cole, O.P. Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Michael Brungardt 11 35 Symposium on Pope Francis’s Patris Corde Year of Saint Joseph, Spiritual Father: Some Meditations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Basil Cole, O.P. Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Andrew Hofer, O.P. & Jonah Teller, O.P. 51 61 77 Articles Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform: A Problematization of Tradition in the Catholic Church and Catholic-Orthodox Rapprochement. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Tomasz Dekert Neither Subtraction, Nor Addition: The Word’s Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature.. . . . . . . . . . . . . James E. Dolezal God’s Power and the Impossible: Who Delineates Them?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Emmanuel Durand, O.P. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas. . . . . . . . . . Anthony T. Flood Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature: The Philosophical and Theological Exegesis of 2 Peter 1:4. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Daniel Joseph Gordon God and the Permission of Evil. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Steven A. Long The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger’s Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Santiago Sanz Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor . . . . . . . . . . . . John Mark Solitario, O.P. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Olli-Pekka Vainio 101 133 159 179 205 241 273 293 315 Book Reviews Thomas Aquinas on the Immateriality of the Human Intellect by Adam Wood.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Michael Augros The Bible and Catholic Ressourcement: Essays On Scripture and Theology by William M. Wright IV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Pablo Gadenz Aesthetics, Vols. I & II by Dietrich von Hildebrand.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Joseph Gamache On Purpose by Michael Ruse. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sean Hayden An Avant-garde Theological Generation:The Nouvelle Théologie and the French Crisis of Modernity by Jon Kirwan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Matthew Levering On Love and Virtue: Theological Essays by Michael S. Sherwin, O.P.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . John Meinert Deification in the Latin Patristic Tradition edited by Jared Ortiz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Stephen Tomlinson 331 335 340 347 352 357 361 The English edition of Nova et Vetera is published quarterly and provides an international forum for theological and philosophical studies from a Thomistic perspective. Founded in 1926 by future Cardinal Charles Journet in association with Jacques Maritain, Nova et Vetera is published in related, distinct French and English editions. The English edition of Nova et Vetera welcomes articles and book reviews in theology, philosophy, and biblical studies that address central contemporary debates and discussions. We seek to be “at the heart of the Church,” faithful to the Magisterium and the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, and devoted to the work of true dialogue. Nova et Vetera (ISSN 1542-7315; ISBN 978-1-64585-209-4) is published quarterly by St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, 1468 Parkview Circle, Steubenville, OH 43952. Nova et Vetera is distributed to institutional subscribers for the St. Paul Center by the Catholic University of America Press. Institutional subscriptions, notifications of change of address, and inquiries concerning subscriptions, back issues, and missing copies should be sent to: JHUP Journals Division, PO Box 19966, Baltimore, MD 21211-0966. All materials published in Nova et Vetera are copyrighted by St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology. © Copyright 2022 by St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology. All rights reserved. POSTMASTER: Please send address change to Nova et Vetera, 1468 Parkview Circle, Steubenville, OH 43952. Periodical Postage Paid at Steubenville, OH. This periodical is indexed in the ATLA Catholic Periodical and Literature Index® (CPLI®), a product of the American Theological Library Association, 300 S. Wacker Dr., Suite 2100, Chicago, IL 60606, USA. Email: atla@atla.com, www.atla.com and is indexed and abstracted in the Emerging Sources Citation Index. Nova et Vetera Subscription Rates: • Individuals: one-year $40.00, two-year $75.00 International: one-year $60.00, two-year $115.00 • Students: one-year $30.00, two-year $50.00 International: one-year $40.00, two-year $70.00 • Colleges, Universities, Seminaries, and Institutions: one-year $110.00, one-year print + electronic subscription $150.00 International: one-year $135.00 To subscribe online, please visit http://www.nvjournal.net. For subscription inquiries, email us at novaetvetera@stpaulcenter.com or phone 740-264-9535. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 1–9 1 Tracts for the Times 1 Beginning with this issue, Nova et Vetera will be reviving the Oxford Movement’s Tracts for the Times. The Tracts were originally published anonymously, until Tract 18 appeared with Edward Bouverie Pusey’s initials. Our Tracts for the Times will likewise appear anonymously at first, though we plan to collect them in a later volume with authors’ names appended. The purpose of anonymity is not to conceal the author—that can hardly be done, since our authors’ distinctive styles will be recognizable to anyone who cares to investigate—but rather to signal that these are not regular Nova et Vetera essays. They are essays meant to light a fire that will spread throughout the Church: a fire fostered by the Holy Spirit and aimed at strengthening the Catholic Church’s commitment—in the face of the impact of religious liberalism as well as of consequent reactionary movements—to what Newman termed the “dogmatic principle” and the “sacramental principle.” The original Tracts for the Times stimulated a movement within the Anglican Church known as the Oxford Movement. The Tracts aimed to affirm Anglicanism as the true inheritor of the Apostolic Church founded by Jesus Christ. For the Tractarians, the Church of England did not split from the Catholic Church. In their view, the English Reformers merely protested against certain abuses of a theological and a practical kind that had corrupted the Church of Rome. The Church of England tried to warn Rome and others against these corruptions. Thus, according to the Tractarians, it was Rome that split from the Church of England, and the Tractarians prayed that Rome could be reclaimed from its errors. Until then, they hoped that the Church of England, faithful to the Apostolic Church, would continue to steer between Protestant private judgment and Biblicism on the one hand, and Roman papalism, devotional excesses, and rationalism on the other hand. The first Tract, written by Newman and published in early September 1833, laid out the rationale for the Oxford Movement. Parliament had long enjoyed a decisive role in the affairs of the Church of England. In the 2 Anonymous period between 1828 and 1833, however, Parliament had enacted laws that delivered full citizenship and Parliamentary rights to non-Anglicans. To Newman and his friends, it seemed that the power over the Church wielded by non-Anglican Parliamentary liberals could all too easily lead to devastating doctrinal changes. The Tractarians feared that such changes, if they came about, would succeed in assimilating the Church of England, whose doctrine they believed to be a true expression of the apostolic teaching, to the religiously liberal currents of the day. This fear was not unfounded, since there were a number of influential Englishmen, such as Thomas Arnold, proposing this very thing. In additional Tracts written and published by Newman in the Fall of 1833, he sets forth concerns about proposals to alter the Anglican liturgy and Prayer Book (including doctrinal alterations). He insists that Anglican doctrine is grounded in the teachings of the apostles and of the primitive Church, and he discusses the significance of apostolic succession for the credibility of divine revelation and for the standing of the bishops vis-à-vis State power. He reflects upon the possession of the sacraments as a mark of the visible Church of Christ. He exposits the visibility of the Church as taught in Scripture. He denounces the power-mongering of the Bishop of Rome and the problem of papal corruptions of the Gospel, and he delineates the true doctrine and true sacraments of the Church of Christ. In early 1834 Newman published a Tract on the importance of bodily asceticism (such as fasting) for Christian life, thereby linking doctrinal fidelity with the spiritual and moral life. In the same year, he published a Tract arguing that even in times of grave corruption within and without the Church, nevertheless God is with his Church and renewal movements will spring forth. He also published a Tract that discussed precedents for reforming the Anglican Church by ensuring that urban areas have sufficient bishops and priests, as well as a Tract on the rites and practices of the apostolic and primitive Church. As the 1830s progressed, Newman’s Tracts became longer and their subjects more various. In his two Tracts on the “Via Media,” composed as dialogues with someone inquiring into the principles of the Oxford Movement, Newman addresses the view that “the genius and principles of our Church have ever been what is commonly called Protestant.”1 Newman explains what he means by “Protestant” and “Popery,” and he answers accusations that the Oxford Movement is tantamount to the revival of 1 John Henry Newman, Tract 38, in Newman, Tracts for the Times, ed. James Tolhurst (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2013), 102–15, at 103. Tracts for the Times 1 3 Popery. He argues that the English Reformers and the best tradition of the English Church advocate a “Via Media” between Protestant and Roman perspectives. In this light he treats the purpose and standing of the Thirty-Nine Articles and the Prayer Book. He enumerates various Roman errors, including transubstantiation, the denial of the cup to the laity, the notion of the Mass as the Church’s sacrifice, indulgences, purgatory, celebration of the liturgy in Latin, compulsory confession to a priest, the invocation of saints, the notion of seven sacraments, and the claim that the pope has universal jurisdiction. After condemning these errors, he devotes his second Tract on the Via Media to the task of criticizing the current practices of the Church of England, and to warning against the twin problems of Erastianism (State governance of the Church) and Latitudinarianism (religious liberalism) currently threatening the Anglican Church. During the same period, Newman produced a Tract on “The Grounds of Our Faith” that critiqued the Biblicism of Protestants. Biblicism rejects the authority of the doctrine and practice of the primitive Church, as for instance with regard to baptism or the episcopacy. Newman shows that Biblicism is no secure ground even for the doctrine of the Trinity. In another Tract, “The Visible Church,” he responded to a critic who had claimed that Newman’s “doctrine of the one Catholic Church in effect excludes Dissenters, nay, Presbyterians, from salvation”—an assertion that Newman explains is baseless, even if the full means of salvation are found only in the Church of England.2 Additionally, he wrote a Tract titled “On the Controversy with the Romanists” in order to explain in greater detail why the Tractarians, while often agreeing with Roman Catholicism, continue to remain separated from Rome due to the various corruptions he had earlier enumerated. He adds here some concerns about what he believes to be Rome’s exaggerated Marian devotion. Although he affirms that Anglicanism is in need of renewal, he denies that Anglicanism has ever gone astray in any fundamental way. He emphasizes, too, that the Church of England is not Protestant, even if popular opinion often imagines it is. From Tract 73 onward, Newman’s Tracts contain some of his most powerful and profound writing. Tract 73 is “On the Introduction of Rationalistic Principles into Religion”; Tract 83 is “The Patristical Idea of Antichrist”; Tract 85 is “Holy Scripture in Its Relation to the Catholic Creed”; and Tract 90 is “Remarks on Certain Passages in the Thirty-Nine Articles.” Although not as significant, there is also Newman’s praise of the Roman Breviary in Tract 75, his lengthy and erudite argument against 2 John Henry Newman, Tract 47, in Tracts for the Times, 136–39, at 137. 4 Anonymous the existence of Purgatory in Tract 79, and his defense of the Tractarian understanding of baptismal regeneration in Tract 82. In Tract 73, we find a significant investigation of faith and reason, in light of the concrete mysteries of faith. Newman responds in detail to an author who holds that scriptural revelation is fundamentally about ethics—God’s character and ours. Recognizing this claim to be nascent religious liberalism, Newman points out that the doctrine of the Trinity (for example) is not simply a practical doctrine—aimed at shaping us morally—but above all is a statement about God in himself. In the same Tract, Newman also responds to an author who describes Jesus in purely human terms, as though Jesus’s status as the divine Son did not matter for an accurate portrait of our Lord. Newman also transcribes some passages about Friedrich Schleiermacher’s writings. These passages serve to clarify Newman’s fears about a religiously liberal Christianity that renounces dogmatic realism. Newman’s Tract on the Church Fathers’ understanding of Antichrist belongs to the process by which he moved away from his early view that the Papacy was the Antichrist. His Tract on Scripture and the Creed hammers home the deficiencies of Biblicism. If all Christian doctrine has to be proven from Scripture—rather than found in Scripture when read in light of Tradition—then, says Newman, Christian faith is on shaky ground, because Scripture is not meant to be a catechetical handbook. Once one starts rejecting doctrines as unbiblical, one eventually will have to perform the same procedure upon doctrines such as the distinct divine Personhood of the Holy Spirit. One will end up rejecting the canonicity of Scripture itself. In this Tract from 1838 (Tract 85), Newman also sums up what he thinks will soon result from religious liberalism: “The view henceforth is to be, that Christianity does not exist in documents, any more than in institutions; in other words, the Bible will be given up as well as the Church.”3 Christianity will be deemed to have had a salutary historical role in producing the current enlightened outlook, and Christianity may even be appreciated as a moral force; but Christianity will no longer be thought to have given to the world an objectively divine teaching or a divine communion. Through these Tracts along with further Tracts by Pusey, John Keble, 3 John Henry Newman, “Holy Scripture in Its Relation to the Catholic Creed [Tract 85],” in Newman, Discussions and Arguments on Various Subjects, ed. Gerard Tracey and James Tolhurst (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2004), 109–253, at 233. Tracts for the Times 1 5 and others, the Oxford Movement gathered numerous adherents. It also provoked a strong anti-Catholicizing reaction, especially after the posthumous publication of Richard Hurrell Froude’s papers in the late 1830s. The final straw for the Oxford Movement was Newman’s Tract 90 (1841). Having long argued that the Thirty-Nine Articles could be interpreted from a Catholicizing perspective just as well (or, at least, almost as well) as they could be interpreted from a Protestant perspective, Newman decided in “Remarks on Certain Passages in the Thirty-Nine Articles” to test his theory that even the most ardent Catholicizers among the Tractarians can in good conscience affirm the Thirty-Nine Articles. The result was explosive. Bishop Bagot of Oxford condemned the Tract, and demanded that the series of Tracts immediately cease—which they did. Eventually, almost all the Anglican Bishops in England formally condemned Newman’s Tract 90, as did many prominent politicians. Oxford University’s governing body, the Heads of all the Colleges, joined in the condemnation. Edward Hawkins, the provost of Newman’s own Oriel College, required candidates for fellowships to repudiate Tract 90. Hawkins removed Richard Church, later Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral, from his fellowship at Oriel for refusing to repudiate Tract 90 or cease lecturing on the Thirty-Nine Articles. Newman himself retreated to Littlemore. In 1843, after a sermon on the Eucharist, Pusey was suspended from further preaching from the Oxford University pulpit.4 In 1845, Newman made his first sacramental confession and was received into the Catholic Church. Numerous other Tractarians preceded or joined him. It seems, then, that the Tracts ended in ecclesiastical disaster and division. If so, why would Nova et Vetera wish to commission a new series of Tracts for the Times? Such a title may seem tantamount to prophesying a future ecclesiastical repudiation of the tenets advocated in our twenty-first-century Tracts. It risks stamping their authors with a label associated with conflict and collapse. From our perspective, however, the Tractarian Movement was far from a failure. For Catholics, the Tractarian Movement was on the contrary one of the greatest developments of the second millennium, bearing fruit in such a great saint and doctor as Newman. In the thirteenth century, Thomas Aquinas did not have to face historical questions about the origins and emergence of the papacy or of the seven sacraments, let alone about 4 For these details and others like them, see Peter B. Nockles, “The Oxford Movement in an Oxford College: Oriel as the Cradle of Tractarianism,” in The Oxford Movement: Europe and the Wider World 1830–1930, ed. Stewart J. Brown and Peter B. Nockles (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 11–33. 6 Anonymous the lateness of patristic testimony to certain Marian doctrines. These questions had energetically emerged by Newman’s day, and they fed a growing religious liberalism that deemed Catholic faith to be unreasonable. In this context, Newman’s contribution was to think brilliantly about the relationship of dogmatic faith to the fruits of historical research, without ever compromising the realism of dogma. He approached this topic from a variety of angles, including reflections on university education, culture, religious pluralism, ecumenism, the broader relationship of faith and reason, biblical exegesis (including allegorical or spiritual exegesis), and the relationship between dogma and spirituality. The Tracts for the Times, therefore, did not end in disaster from a Catholic perspective. They have borne tremendous fruit for the Church in the nearly two centuries that have followed, including during the Second Vatican Council and at the present moment. In his Apologia Pro Vita Sua, Newman identifies the crucial reason for their ongoing relevance: their advocacy for what he terms the “dogmatic principle” and the “sacramental principle.” These principles simply could not be more relevant today. Throughout his Anglican years, as Newman recalls in the Apologia, he fought “liberalism” or “the anti-dogmatic principle and its developments.”5 Newman was well aware that “liberalism” has many meanings, political and otherwise. Specifically, he fought religious liberalism, that is, the notion that Christianity does not communicate divine truth—true revelation about God, Christ, and humanity. In his speech in Rome upon his elevation to the Cardinalate, Newman reiterated his opposition to “the spirit of liberalism in religion. . . . Liberalism in religion is the doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion.”6 The dogmatic principle means that the truths articulated in the Creed about God the Trinity, the Incarnation, baptism, and so forth accurately (though certainly not exhaustively) communicate ontological realities. The sacramental principle is equally crucial. Newman defines it in the Apologia as the belief that there is “a visible Church with sacraments and rites which are the channels of invisible grace.” 7 As an Anglican, he had 5 6 7 John Henry Newman, Apologia Pro Vita Sua (New York: Doubleday, 1956), 163. John Henry Newman, “Biglietto Speech,” available at newmanreader.org/works/ addresses/file2.html. In this speech, Newman refers to the movement in favor of State toleration of all religions without preference for any particular religion as true, but his definition of religious liberalism as “the doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion” is the key element. See also Newman’s “Note A.: Liberalism,” appended to his Apologia Pro Vita Sua, ed. Charles Frederick Harrold (New York: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1947), 259–69. Newman, Apologia Pro Vita Sua (1956 ed.), 164. Tracts for the Times 1 7 in view the accomplishment of the forgiveness of sins, or justification, by the sacrament of baptism. He also had in view episcopal and priestly ordination. As a Catholic, he affirmed all seven sacraments, as well as the divine institution of the Church’s offices. For Newman, the sacramental principle also involves a particular understanding of human history, namely, as saturated with divine presence and as under the guidance of providence. Underlying every visible reality is the creative knowledge and will of God. God works out the redemption of humankind through visible realities such as Christ’s holy humanity and the members of the Church across the centuries. This understanding of God’s presence and action in history makes plausible Newman’s claim that the Catholic Church is able to preserve and develop, without ever making an error in solemn teaching, the apostolic deposit of faith bestowed upon the Church by Christ. The dogmatic and sacramental principles defended by Newman and the Tractarians are widely denied today. A substantial part of the populace in Western countries is effectively atheist. Even among Catholics, how many take their baptismal grace with particular seriousness? How many Catholics believe that the Eucharist unites them with Christ’s Cross and resurrection in an ontologically real way? Few Catholics today take regular advantage of the sacrament of reconciliation. The Church teaches that the sacrament of marriage seals the indissolubility of a marriage and that the sacrament provides the grace to live out that indissolubility. But most Catholics seem to have the same understanding of marriage as does the surrounding culture. The sacrament of holy orders ontologically changes a man by giving him a unique participation in Christ’s prophetic, sanctifying, and governing office. But this seems to be belied by the fact that priests and bishops have too often caused scandal. If there is a crisis in understanding and living the sacramental mediation of grace, there is also today an equally grave, or perhaps even graver crisis in dogmatic realism. This crisis is reflected especially in academic theology, though it is also reflected pastorally in the ever-increasing numbers of young people leaving the Church. Although various reasons are given for why young people leave—from the Church’s strict sexual teachings to the seemingly difficult relationship of science and faith—at the heart of the matter is that many young people do not believe that Jesus is God incarnate. This loss of faith does not happen in a vacuum: much of it flows from what they learn in college or university. In this vulnerable and formative time in their young lives, rather than claiming the faith as their own, they lose the faith. In many Catholic theology or religious studies departments today, the course on Christology is about the liberative praxis of Jesus of Nazareth against all priestly and patriarchal systems, and the course on 8 Anonymous the Trinity has to do not with God but with human social structures and power dynamics. Even for seminarians, it can be unclear why their pastoral work in parishes must actually be grounded in an ongoing study of the divine mysteries of faith. To appeal to Scripture and Tradition is often seen in academic circles as fundamentalism or “classicism,” neglectful of the contextual matrices in which expressions and experiences of Christian community are continually changing. History is assumed to be about anything but the entrance of the sovereign Lord of history in a manger in Bethlehem to teach the true way of salvation, to die for the forgiveness of all sins, to rise from the dead so that fallen human beings can share in God’s life forever, beginning here and now in the Church. In short, like the Tractarians in 1833, we today perceive growing pressures to assimilate the Word of God to religiously liberal trends. In response, our new series of Tracts aims to reassert the dogmatic principle and the sacramental principle. The doctrines that we have in view are present in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Newman points out that the Tractarian Movement never sought to produce a mere party in the Anglican Church while the main line of the Anglican Church continued on in the opposite direction. Neither the original Tracts for the Times nor our Tracts intend to rally a minority within the Church to partake in an antiquarian way of living and believing. Rather, allowing fully for the diversity of theological schools and spiritualities that has always characterized the Catholic Church,8 our Tracts 8 Newman observes in this regard, “It is a well-known point in controversy, to say that the Catholic Church has not any real unity more than Protestantism; for, if Lutherans are divided in creed from Calvinists, and both from Anglicans, and the various denominations of Dissenters each has its own doctrine and its own interpretation, yet Dominicans and Franciscans, Jesuits and Jansenists, have had their quarrels too. Nay, that at this moment the greatest alienation, rivalry, and difference of opinion exist among the members of the Catholic priesthood, so that the Church is but nominally one, and her pretended unity resolves itself into nothing more specious than an awkward and imperfect uniformity” (John Henry Newman, Certain Difficulties Felt by Anglicans in Catholic Teaching, vol. 1 [London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1897], 297). Expanding upon this point, Newman sets forth a sampling of the broad range of theological differences among diverse schools and individuals within the Catholic Church; and he also grants the existence of plentiful strife among Catholics. Newman’s answer is as follows: “Left to himself, each Catholic likes and would maintain his own opinion and his private judgment just as much as a Protestant; and he has it, and he maintains it, just so far as the Church does not, by the authority of Revelation, supersede it. The very moment the Church ceases to speak, at the very point at which she, that is, God who speaks by her, circumscribes her range of teaching, Tracts for the Times 1 9 seek to speak to the whole Catholic Church with a vision for the Church, a vision that gladly appreciates doctrinal development but also warns against doctrinal and sacramental corruption. One thing that stands out about the original Tracts for the Times is how diverse they were in length and in topic. Some are barely a few pages long; others can be almost a short book. While sharing the same general perspective, some treat a particular sacrament; others range broadly on ecclesiastical issues of the day; others are doctrinal and exegetical; others pertain to spirituality and the Christian moral life. The Tracts in Nova et Vetera’s series, too, will exhibit such diversity. It is now almost 170 years since Newman penned the first Tract, the beginning of a movement that, as Newman observed in 1850, had “surprising success,” insofar as “opinions which, twenty years ago, were not held by any but Catholics, or at most only in fragmentary portions by isolated persons, are now the profession of thousands.”9 If Christ Jesus permits the world to endure another 170 years, and if in 2192 there is somewhere a reader of this now dusty issue of Nova et Vetera who wonders why we tried to imitate Newman’s project without his brilliant pen, the answer is that we are striving to act, just as Newman did, out of love for “the Church Catholic and Apostolic, set up from the beginning.”10 In accord with the dogmatic principle and the sacramental principle as understood by Newman, it is our desire to assist the Church in the rough waters and N&V ever-darkening storms of our times. 9 10 there private judgment of necessity starts up; there is nothing to hinder it. The intellect of man is active and independent: he forms opinions about everything; he feels no deference for another’s opinion, except in proportion as he thinks that that other is more likely than he to be right; and he never absolutely sacrifices his own opinion, except when he is sure that the other knows for certain. He is sure that God knows; therefore, if he is a Catholic, he sacrifices his opinion to the Word of God, speaking through His Church. But, from the nature of the case, there is nothing to hinder his having his own opinion, and expressing it, whenever, and so far as, the Church, the oracle of Revelation, does not speak” (301). Newman, Certain Difficulties, 9. Whether Newman is correct in this judgment, or whether the Tractarians simply carried forward the High Church party, is perhaps an open question. Newman, Apologia Pro Vita Sua (1956 ed.), 149. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 11–33 11 St. Thomas and the “Good News” of Punishment? Basil Cole, O.P. Dominican House of Studies Washington, DC The Blessed Charles Foucault once wrote something like, “He who can suffer and love will do things which this world thinks is impossible.” Yet, no one needs a special revelation to know that suffering bodily and spiritual afflictions is an evil. And if God is infinite love, Job pushes the mind of the Christian to wonder how God can inflict evil, directly or indirectly, on his faithful people: Naked I came forth from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall go back again. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord! We accept good things from God; and should we not accept evil?” (Job 1:21; 2:10b) Pure reason is faced with a mystery, but with divine faith, there is an answer given by Saint Thomas Aquinas: This is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist, and out of it produce good.1 It should be noted that the desire to hurt is present in a man of himself; but the power to harm comes from God’s permission. And God does not permit the wicked to inflict as much harm as they would like but he sets a limit. “Hitherto you shall come, and shall not go further; and here, you shall break your swelling saves” (Job 38. 11). So too the devil 1 Summa theologiae [ST] I, q. 2, a. 3, ad 1, Translations from ST are taken from the New Advent site at newadvent.org/summa/. 12 Basil Cole, O.P. harassed Job only as much as the Lord permitted. So too, Arius did not harm the Church, only as the Lord permitted.2 We are led to bear our troubles in patience. Although every created thing is from God and is good according to its nature, yet, if something harms us or brings us pain, we believe that such comes from God, not as a fault in Him, but because God permits no evil that is not for good. Affliction purifies from sin, brings low the guilty, and urges on the good to a love of God: “If we have received good things from the hand of God, why should we not receive evil?” [Job 2:10].3 Job asks the rhetorical question “should we not accept evil?”—but he gives no reasons why we should. That God produces good from evil and that there are limits to the evils he permits cannot always be known by experience in this life. Saint Paul assures the new followers of Jesus that “God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength but with your testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it” (1 Cor 10:13). However, for those enduring such trials, this does not seem to be the case. It requires the same faith that believes that the Blessed Sacrament is the body of Christ. The problem is also mentioned in the Catechism: §164. Now, however, “we walk by faith, not by sight,” we perceive God as “in a mirror, dimly” and only “in part.” Even though enlightened by him in whom it believes, faith is often lived in darkness and can be put to the test. The world we live in often seems very far from the one promised us by faith. Our experiences of evil and suffering, injustice and death, seem to contradict the Good News; they can shake our faith and become a temptation against it. 2 3 Super 2 Tim 3, lec. 2, no. 111, in Commentary on the Letters of Saint Paul to the Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus and Philemon, trans. Fabian R. Larcher, O.P., ed. J. Mortensen and E. Alarcon (Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012). Summa contra gentiles [SCG] III ch. 144, no. 3, in On the Truth of the Catholic Faith, Book Three, trans. Anton Pegis (Garden City, NY: Image, 1955). St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 13 Death as Relief from Suffering or the Greatest Suffering, Objectively Speaking? Concerning the evil of death, a substantial change of profound consequences takes place. What causes death may be painful or may occur in one’s sleep. That a particular judgment on one’s life by God takes place leading to rewards or punishments is taught by the universal and ordinary magisterium of the Church and is clearly expressed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church [CCC] (supporting Scripture citations from its footnotes included here in brackets):4 §1021. Death puts an end to human life as the time open to either accepting or rejecting the divine grace manifested in Christ [2 Tim 1:9–10]. The New Testament speaks of judgment primarily in its aspect of the final encounter with Christ in his second coming, but also repeatedly affirms that each will be rewarded immediately after death in accordance with his works and faith. The parable of the poor man Lazarus and the words of Christ on the cross to the good thief, as well as other New Testament texts speak of a final destiny of the soul—a destiny which can be different for some and for others [see Luke 16:22; 23:43; Matt 16:26; 2 Cor 5:8; Phil 1:23; Heb 9:27; 12:23]. §1022. Each man receives his eternal retribution in his immortal soul at the very moment of his death, in a particular judgment that refers his life to Christ: either entrance into the blessedness of heaven—through a purification5 or immediately6 —or immediate and everlasting damnation.7 4 5 6 7 All quotations of Scripture, patristic sources, councils, and the like that are given as being quoted by the Catechism are given in the form in which they are found there, which may differ slightly from translations commonly used in the field or even on the Vatican’s website. Often magisterial sources in the Catechism are taken from the edition of Heinrich Denzinger’s Enchiridion symbolorum, definitionum et declarationum edited by Adolf Schönmetzer (36th ed.), cited in their notes (which I reproduce here) by the DS numbers. When I draw on Denzinger myself, it is from the 43rd ed., edited by Peter Hünermann, in the English–Latin edition done by Ignatius Press (2012), edited by Robert Fastiggi and Anne Englund Nash, by DH numbers. CCC note 592: See Council of Lyons II (1274; DS 857–58); Council of Florence (1439; DS 1304–6); Council of Trent (1563; DS 1820). CCC note 593: See Benedict XII, Benedictus Deus (1336; DS 1000–1001); John XXII, Ne Super His (1334; DS 990). CCC note 594: See Benedict XII, Benedictus Deus (1336; DS 1002). 14 Basil Cole, O.P. Not only is death an evil, but being judged by God for one’s life, while not an evil, is fearful because there can be bad consequences of this judgment. Likewise, the desire to live on in good health is based upon the first inclination of human nature to preserve its very being.8 From the purely natural point of view, it seems mysterious that no one achieves his or her fulfillment in this life because it comes to an end and then one is largely forgotten. While there is a desire for immortality and some philosophers claim to prove that the soul lives on, immortality cannot be known with absolute certitude by pure reason: how will one exist after death, and will there be retribution for evil persons, or rewards for good persons who tried to live upright lives? Naturally speaking, one lives in a conscious or subconscious fear of potential extinction in this life. Death seems to be the ultimate evil if it casts us into some unknown state of either continued existence in a vacuum, or even a return to non-existence. The Cause of the Problem Revelation illuminates both the misery of the human race and the possibility of this misery having a purpose in the providence of an all-merciful God. If Adam and Eve, the first human beings created by the Lord, who represent the future of the human race, had not sinned and been deprived of grace, their offspring would have inherited their gifts of grace given to them. But as a result of their sin, human beings after them are called “fallen,” that is, born into an existence without grace, and so unable to enjoy ultimate bliss or the happiness of contemplation or moral virtue in this life. Death and suffering flow from this “original sin” of theirs, which makes the journey of life difficult. Its purpose is impossible to understand by weakened human reason and will, and with the passions somewhat in rebellion against reason and faith. While made for the happiness, fulfillment, and joy that they naturally desire, humans remain in a state of impotence to achieve it naturally. As Saint Thomas reminds his readers: For in the state of innocence it would not have been necessary for anyone to make progress in virtue through painful exercise. Hence the very fact that there is pain in such cases is traced back to original sin as its cause.9 8 9 ST I-II, q. 94, a. 3. ST I-II, q. 87, a. 7. St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 15 Further Consequences of the Fall in Light of Today’s Coronavirus It has been noted by many professionals who have blogs that the quarantine imposed by state governments to quell the coronavirus has produced many ill effects on the populace: loneliness, depression among other mental problems, heart complications, hypertension, increased smoking and eating, insomnia, drug abuse, suicides, use of pornography, sexual abuse, and a loss of a sense of self-worth. So, a question arises in the minds of faithful, thinking Catholics: Could God have created a better universe? Saint Thomas Aquinas gives an answer which is not consoling: Given the things that actually exist, the universe cannot be better. This is because of the utter appropriateness of the order that God has established among the things that actually exist, and it is in this order that the good of the universe consists. If just one of these things were better, then the balance of the order would be upset, in just the same way that if one string of a harp were tightened more than it should be, then the sound of the harp would be ruined. However, God could make other things, or add other things to those He has in fact made, and in that case this other universe would be better.10 Unless one is a mystic or a victim soul who suffers for the sins of others, ordinary sinners who have serious physical and moral trials often find that their miseries are too great, and last too long for a loving God to have permitted them. They feel the need to make “deals” with God such as promising that if he takes the suffering or temptations away, they promise to do something special for him or for the Church. Likewise, elderly people in rest homes who are filled with loneliness, or pain, and are unable to do anything but lie in bed, often pray, and pray devoutly during many months or years for death to end their misery, only to be disappointed, when they wake up morning after morning still alive. Likewise, parents and spouses suffer deeply when their child or spouse has cancer and is slowly dying, with no hope of a cure. Unfortunately, professors and preachers often fail to instruct their flocks on the necessity to pray for the grace to suffer for the glory and God and to beg for the salvation of their friends and relatives who may be far from God.11 10 11 ST I, q. 25, a. 6, ad 3. Council of Trent (DH 1536 and 1568); see also Aquinas, De veritate, q. 24, a. 13 and St. Paul’s observation that “God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested 16 Basil Cole, O.P. The Human Person: The Primary and Exclusive Cause of Sin The evil of sin is “properly opposed to the uncreated good itself, since it is contrary to the fulfillment of God’s will, as well as contrary to the divine love by which God’s good is loved for itself.”12 If God is neither directly nor indirectly the cause of sin, but permits or tolerates the evil of sin, is he the cause of a lonely, painful, and sickly life? On a contemporary matter, is he the cause of the coronavirus? Is not God supposed to protect his loved ones from sickness, unforeseen death, disasters? Does he merely allow them to suffer or does he directly cause these calamities of body and soul? On a much broader scale, why does he not answer prayers for healing, or on a yet much larger scale put an end to abortion, wars, floods, and fires that destroy towns and cities? Why these evils exist after many intense prayers offered by millions of his followers is a perennial question. The teaching Church in her Catechism answers, following Sacred Scripture, that original sin and personal sin have deleterious consequence which produce these evils both physical and moral: §400. The harmony in which they had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed: the control of the soul’s spiritual faculties over the body is shattered; the union of man and woman becomes subject to tensions, their relations henceforth marked by lust and domination [see Gen 3:7–16]. Harmony with creation is broken: visible creation has become alien and hostile to man [see Gen 3:17, 19]. Because of man, creation is now subject “to its bondage to decay” [Rom 8:21]. Finally, the consequence explicitly foretold for this disobedience will come true: man will “return to the ground” [Gen 3:19; cf. 2:17], for out of it he was taken. Death makes its entrance into human history [see Rom 5:12]. Here the Catechism quotes §13 of the Second Vatican Council’s Gaudium et Spes: What Revelation makes known to us is confirmed by our own experience. For when man looks into his own heart he finds that he is drawn towards what is wrong and sunk in many evils which cannot come from his good creator. Often refusing to acknowledge God as his source, man has also upset the relationship which should link 12 beyond your strength but with your testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it” (1 Cor 10:13). ST I, q. 48, a. 6. St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 17 him to his last end, and at the same time he has broken the right order that should reign within himself as well as between himself and other men and all creatures. Since God cannot be the cause of sin, humans are the primary or exclusive cause.13 God on the other hand is the primary cause of punishing the disorder introduced by sin, based upon his infinite justice, which has been flaunted by personal sin. Can there be any “good news” about the evils of adversity and torment for the guilty, and even for the innocent? Punishment: What Is It? Punishment is a harsh reality that goes contrary to a person’s will, disordered desires, and delight in apparent goods. They are “not inflicted by God for their own sake, as if he delights in them, but they are for something else, namely, for imposing of order on creatures, in which order the good of the universe consists.”14 Some kind of evil (real or perceived as such) is inflicted in this life on the body, or on the “heart” or core of a person, but not necessarily in this life; it may take place only after death can be voluntary, that is, by being accepted as purification in this life, or non-voluntary, and then by being simply endured.15 Suffering is an experience of harms that differ in kind and degree. These harms causing sorrow could be harsh words from neighbors that humiliate, or worse, the limitation of freedom imposed on convicted criminals by the authority of the state. Physical pain 13 14 15 See ST I-II, q. 79, a. 1: “Now God cannot be directly the cause of sin, either in Himself or in another, since every sin is a departure from the order which is to God as the end: whereas God inclines and turns all things to Himself as to their last end, as Dionysius states (Div. nom. i): so that it is impossible that He should be either to Himself or to another the cause of departing from the order which is to Himself. Therefore, He cannot be directly the cause of sin. In like manner neither can He cause sin indirectly. For it happens that God does not give some the assistance, whereby they may avoid sin, which assistance were He to give, they would not sin. But He does all this according to the order of His wisdom and justice, since He Himself is Wisdom and Justice: so that if someone sin it is not imputable to Him as though He were the cause of that sin.” SCG III, ch. 144, no. 10. See ST Suppl., q. 2, a. 2: “A thing is said to be voluntary in two ways. First, by an absolute act of the will; and thus no punishment is voluntary, because the very notion of punishment is that it be contrary to the will. Secondly, a thing is said to be voluntary by a conditional act of the will: thus cautery is voluntary for the sake of regaining health. Hence a punishment may be voluntary in two ways. First, because by being punished we obtain some good, and thus the will itself undertakes a punishment, as instanced in satisfaction, or when a man accepts a punishment gladly, and would not have it not to be, as in the case of martyrdom.” 18 Basil Cole, O.P. from accidents or illnesses, psychological pain from disappointments, failures, losses, or the death of friends and spouses, and the like are not directly from God, but mysteriously integrated in his providential governance. They often arise from bad or mistaken behaviors that produce unwanted physical or psychological consequences, such as smoking or drinking too much alcohol. In our time, a slow process of dying may inflict such inner confusion on a person that his life itself comes to seem unreal, which adds to the sorrows of affliction. Suffering as Purely Punitive or Purifying Furthermore, someone can be inflicted with chastisements throughout life that remains purely punitive, seemingly endless and empty of personal meaning except for being occasions for brooding or getting angry with God.16 On the other hand, depending on one’s attitude and assisting grace from God, suffering can purify one’s mind and heart, by uprooting false motivations and desires, leading to a transformation of one’s outlook on life.17 Punishment that is received well in faith can lead to aversion from a disordered love of the things of this world and a deeper conversion to God. 16 17 See ST Suppl., q. 15, a. 2: “Compensation for a past offense can be enforced either by the offender or by another. When it is enforced by another, such compensation is of a vindictive rather than of a satisfactory nature, whereas when it is made by the offender, it is also satisfactory. Consequently, if the scourges, which are inflicted by God on account of sin, become in some way the act of the sufferer they acquire a satisfactory character. Now they become the act of the sufferer in so far as he accepts them for the cleansing of his sins, by taking advantage of them patiently. If, however, he refuses to submit to them patiently, then they do not become his personal act in any way, and are not of a satisfactory, but merely of a vindictive character.” See SCG IV, ch. 158: “Now, man renounces sin in his will provided he repents his past sin and forms the intention of avoiding it in the future. So, it is necessary that a man who is rising again from sin both repent for past sin and intend to avoid future sin. Indeed, if he would not make up his mind to refrain from sin, then sin in itself would not be against his will. But, if he did will to refrain from sin, but was not sorry for past sin, then this sin that he had committed would not be against his will. Now, the movement whereby one moves away from something is contrary to the movement whereby one approaches it; thus, whitening is contrary to blackening. Consequently, the will must abandon sin by moving in a contrary direction from those movements whereby it was inclined toward sin. Now, it was inclined toward sin by appetition and enjoyment in regard to lower things. Therefore, it must move away from sin by means of certain penances whereby it suffers some injury because of the sin that it has committed. For, just as the will was drawn toward consent to the sin by means of pleasure, so is it strengthened in the detestation of sin by means of penances.” St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 19 This results in a better ordered love of the goods of this world and, better still, a love of divine gifts bringing a closer intimacy with God. Thus, one is enabled to accept the designs of God’s providence with a more authentic desire to change one’s life from lukewarmness to more fervent love.18 The Catechism reminds the follower of the Lord Jesus that either new moral evils can flow from suffering or the reverse, a deeper desire for God and acceptance of his personal plan: §1501. Illness can lead to anguish, self-absorption, sometimes even despair and revolt against God. It can also make a person more mature, helping him discern in his life what is not essential so that he can turn toward that which is. Very often illness provokes a search for God and a return to him. Faith reminds the disciple of the Lord Jesus of his abiding presence as God in one’s daily responsibilities.19 Therefore, God is in all things by his power, inasmuch as all things are subject to his power; he is by his presence in all things, as all things are bare and open to his eyes; he is in all things by his essence, inasmuch as he is present to all as the cause of their being. To achieve one’s ultimate destiny as well as one’s personal mission in this life, one also has to embrace the crosses of one’s life, as expressed by the pithy saying “no cross, no crown.” Some of these crosses could be simple inconveniences, irritating persons or serious physical pains and heartaches of spirit. Those rare Christians who are highly advanced in their relationship with God will ask for a cross from God and will soar in their prayer and apostolic life. Others not so highly advanced will sometimes request the same sufferings, only to sin by presumption due to ignorance of their limitations. As a result, they will not soar higher in virtue and grace because they were not ready for such heroic desires and actions. They thought they could shoulder great crosses principally by their own efforts 18 19 See ST I, q. 20, a. 4, ad 4: “The penitent and the innocent are related as exceeding and exceeded. For whether innocent or penitent, those are the better and better loved who have most grace. Other things being equal, innocence is the nobler thing and the more beloved. God is said to rejoice more over the penitent than over the innocent, because often penitents rise from sin more cautious, humble, and fervent. Hence Gregory commenting on these words [Homily 34 on the Gospels] says that, ‘In battle the general loves the soldier who after flight returns and bravely pursues the enemy, more than him who has never fled, but has never done a brave deed.’” See ST I, q. 8, a. 1, sc: “A thing is wherever it operates. But God operates in all things, according to Isa. 26:12, Lord . . . Thou hast wrought all our works in us. Therefore, God is in all things.” 20 Basil Cole, O.P. and only secondarily with God’s help. Their love for God and his will, perhaps from their own illusions about God, becomes diminished. If they fall into grave sin, the infused virtue of charity will be returned through the sacrament of reconciliation, sometimes diminished or sometimes greater, due to a more intense sorrow for past sins.20 Recently I received a letter from someone very discouraged about the moral fabric of the United States. He penned the following: The Eternal Father will no longer countenance so much impurity so inimical to human beings having been made in the Image and Likeness of God, including adultery, divorce, artificial contraception, other vices destructive of chaste marriages, abortion of children, organized human trafficking of children for perverse abuse, sodomy and sodomite unions, pornography, drug addiction, neglect of the poor, especially children and widows, etc., etc. I think that a number of massive natural disasters are on the horizon and that the U.S.A. has so lost its special role in the End Times that there is no further need for the U.S.A. as a distinct country with any role in Christian leadership in Divine Providence. The author could have been prophetically speaking not only about the United States but also about many countries from the First World to the Third World. Nevertheless, Saint Thomas Aquinas would say that the worst punishment God can inflict on these countries is not natural disasters but letting people continue to sin and become so hardened that they die unrepentant.21 And at the same time, the mystery is that in tolerating such 20 21 See SCG IV, ch. 158: “In principle this can happen but it is rare. It should be kept in mind, however, that when the mind is turned away from sin the displeasure with sin can be so forceful, and the attachment of the mind to God so strong, that no obligation to punishment will remain. For, as may be gathered from things said earlier, the punishment that a person suffers after the remission of sin is necessary so that the mind may adhere more firmly to the good; since man is chastised by punishments, these punishments are, then, like remedies. It is also necessary so that the order of justice may be observed, in the sense that he who has sinned must stand the penalty. But love for God is enough to set the mind of man firmly in the direction of the good, especially if this love be strong; and displeasure for a past fault, when intense, brings great sorrow. Consequently, through the strength of one’s love for God, and of one’s hatred of past sin, there is removed the need for punishments of satisfaction or of purification. Moreover, if this strength be not great enough to set aside punishments entirely, nevertheless, the stronger it is, the smaller will be the punishment that suffices.” ST I-II, q. 79, a. 2; cf. q. 87, a. 2. St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 21 horrible evils, it is absolutely certain that God can bring good out of all this morass, though it is not immediately evident what that good is, or will be, in this life.22 As the Catechism teaches about God’s infinite goodness: §311. Angels and men, as intelligent and free creatures, have to journey toward their ultimate destinies by their free choice and preferential love. They can therefore go astray. Indeed, they have sinned. Thus has moral evil, incommensurably more harmful than physical evil, entered the world. God is in no way, directly or indirectly, the cause of moral evil.23 He permits it, however, because he respects the freedom of his creatures and, mysteriously, knows how to derive good from it [emphasis mine]. The Catechism here quotes Saint Augustine in support: For almighty God, . . . because he is supremely good, would never allow any evil whatsoever to exist in his works if he were not so all-powerful and good as to cause good to emerge from evil itself [emphasis mine].24 The Catechism continues: §312. In time we can discover that God in his almighty providence can bring a good from the consequences of an evil, even a moral evil, caused by his creatures [emphasis mine]. . . . From the greatest moral evil ever committed—the rejection and murder of God’s only Son, caused by the sins of all men—God, by his grace that “abounded all the more” [Rom 5:20], brought the greatest of goods: the glorification of Christ and our redemption. But for all that, evil never becomes a good. §313. “We know that in everything God works for good for those who love him” [Rom 8:28]. The constant witness of the saints confirms this truth.25 22 23 24 25 ST I-II, q. 79, a. 4, ad 1. CCC note 176: St. Augustine, De libero arbitrio 1.1.2 (Patrologia Latina [PL], 32:1221–23. [See also] St. Aquinas, ST I-II, q. 79, a. 1. CCC note 177: St. Augustine, Enchiridion 2.3 (PL, 40:236). Here the Catechism provides quotes from St. Catherine of Siena, St. Thomas More, and Julian of Norwich (CCC notes 181–83). 22 Basil Cole, O.P. §314. We firmly believe that God is master of the world and of its history. But the ways of his providence are often unknown to us. Only at the end, when our partial knowledge ceases, when we see God “face to face” [I Cor 13:12], will we fully know the ways by which—even through the dramas of evil and sin—God has guided his creation to that definitive sabbath rest [see Gen 2:2] for which he created heaven and earth. What that definitive Sabbath rest is remains either obscure or simply unknown, either by experience or reason. Simple faith amid the trials of daily life is required to affirm that God is producing something good from them without necessarily knowing how he is doing it or what that good is. The evil of physical suffering, really distinct from the evil of sin, must be placed within the context of the goodness of God without being able to experientially understand that goodness. The Catechism is not naive about the trials and sorrows of this life when it teaches that, of themselves, notwithstanding potentially good outcomes, these evils may also, and often do, cause tumults in people’s lives: §1500. Illness and suffering have always been among the gravest problems confronted in human life. In illness, man experiences his powerlessness, his limitations, and his finitude. Every illness can make us glimpse death. The Positive Side of the Gospel We Prefer to Hear The most attractive and positively motivating revelations of the Gospel begin with the raising of human nature to a heavenly life by grace, which in turn brings infused theological and moral virtues to elevate the acquired virtues to supernatural motives, the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit for more difficult acts of virtue, the indwelling of the Holy Trinity, either ordinary or exceptional charisms for service to others, and an openness to receive assisting or actual graces for one’s due responsibilities, inspirations of the Holy Spirit, as well as power to resist temptation to commit grave or deliberate venial sin.26 Further, sins can be forgiven throughout one’s life by receiving the sacrament of penance or by the prayer of perfect contrition itself. In addition, it is revealed in Sacred Scripture that each person 26 See ST I-II, q. 109, a. 8, ad 2: “Man can avoid each but not every act of sin, except by grace, as stated above. Nevertheless, since it is by his own shortcoming that he does not prepare himself to have grace, the fact that he cannot avoid sin without grace does not excuse him from sin.” St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 23 has a guardian angel as a companion on the way of salvation, assisting by persuasion and even bringing actual graces to the person.27 Jesus Christ is with his people in the Blessed Sacrament and also comes to us in the other six sacraments through the institution of the Church, all of which serves to bring us to the final goal of human life, namely, the beatific vision and the final resurrection of the dead. This final goal is unknown to pure reason but can be known by faith.28 Sacred Scripture is inspired by the Holy Spirit to communicate truths that are necessary for our salvation. Sacred Tradition, partially oral and partially written by the Fathers of the Church, also brings the revelation of truths not explicitly found in Sacred Scripture as interpreted by the universal and ordinary magisterium. Over the centuries, the follower of the Lord Jesus has a certain blueprint to follow in his pilgrimage, whether in consolation or in desolation, if he or she is willing to discover and deepen an understanding of revelation. Eternal and Temporary Punishment However, there is a portion of the Gospel that is not uplifting without reflection. There is the possibility not only of physical pain and interior suffering in this life but also of perpetual and total unhappiness and pain that is called damnation after death. The fact that such a possibility exists is intended for the correction of those now living so as avoid it.29 The Catechism reminds us of what remains the clear New Testament teaching, and in words that can be understood by anyone: §1035. The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, “eternal fire.”30 The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs. While the nature of “eternal fire,” a secondary punishment, remains unknown, the primary punishment is the deep pain and frustration of 27 28 29 30 There are over 365 references to angels in the Bible, such as: “He will give His angels charge concerning you to guard you in all your ways” (Ps 91:11); “See that you despise not one of these little ones: for I say to you, that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father who is in heaven” (Matt 18:10). See St. Paul VI’s Solemn Profession of Faith: Credo of the People of God, among other creeds. ST I, q. 99, a. 1, ad 4. CCC note 615: DS 76; 409; 411; 801; 858; 1002; 1351; 1575; Paul VI, Solemn Profession of Faith: Credo of the People of God, §12. 24 Basil Cole, O.P. losing the beatific vision. Fire on earth is analogous to the “eternal fire,” whose character cannot be known in this life save for the pain of burning, which is more easily understandable than losing the beatific vision.31 There is also the presence in the world of evil spirits who have a relative dominion over the world, and they can tempt humans easily due to the weaknesses of fallen human nature (concupiscence).32 This bad news makes the desire for God, doing his will, and seeking to know him through prayer and study difficult, but not impossible with his assisting grace. The Christian knows this fact so that he or she can be prepared to meet the temptations of the evil one and not be naive about the trials of the spiritual life. The suffering of the body and spirit, wars, earthquakes, droughts, and epidemics among other diseases, and finally death itself are the consequences of original sin.33 However, in the afterlife, there is also a temporary state of painful existence (purgatory) that causes a suffering accepted by separated souls to purify them from the effects of previous sin on earth, grave or not so grave. This “satispassion,” as Thomas calls it, willingly desired, disposes them for the beatific vision.34 From different points of 31 32 33 34 This fire outside of time and space never consumes nor does it ever cease, which are not properties of earthly fire. See ST I, q. 114, a. 1, ad 1: “Firstly by instigating them to sin; and thus they are not sent by God to assail us, but are sometimes permitted to do so according to God’s just judgments. But sometimes their assault is a punishment to man: and thus they are sent by God; as the lying spirit was sent to punish Achab, King of Israel, as is related in 1 Kings 22:20. For punishment is referred to God as its first author. Nevertheless, the demons who are sent to punish, do so with an intention other than that for which they are sent; for they punish from hatred or envy; whereas they are sent by God on account of His justice.” See also where the Council of Trent speaks of a certain limited dominion of the devil over human beings (DH 1511). ST I-II, q. 85, aa. 1–6. See CCC §1031: “The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned [see Council of Florence (DS 1304); Council of Trent (DS 1820; 1547 in DS 1580); see also Benedict XII, Benedictus Deus (DS 1000)]. The Church formulated her doctrine of faith on Purgatory especially at the Councils of Florence and Trent. The tradition of the Church, by reference to certain texts of Scripture, speaks of a cleansing fire [see 1 Cor 3:15; 1 Pet 1:7]. As for certain lesser faults, we must believe that, before the Final Judgment, there is a purifying fire. He who is truth says that whoever utters blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will be pardoned neither in this age nor in the age to come. From this sentence we understand that certain offenses can be forgiven in this age, but certain others in the age to come [St. Gregory the Great, Dialogues 4.39 (PL 77:396); see also Matt 12:31].” St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 25 view, it also is a state of terrible sufferings, which somehow includes a “fire,” far more painful that earthly fire, whose species we cannot fathom. Unlike the fire of damnation, it somehow purifies the dregs or leftovers of sin. However, there are great joys as well as an effect of being in the state of grace and knowing with absolute certitude that heaven will certainly be attained.35 From a certain point of view, the souls in purgatory want these sufferings as the means for entering the bliss of heaven. Furthermore, the journey of the spiritual life to heaven is a war, and all things considered, not an easy road, which is traditionally called a battle with the world, the flesh, and the evil one.36 So, an essential aspect of the good news is the harsh reality called “punishment,” which goes against the unruly human desires and dispositions that are called fomes peccati, or the first movements of sin that results from original sin. Besides, from past illegitimate desires and psychological dregs of sin come sinful dispositions that are ready to spring forth into sinful actions like lava from volcanoes.37 These interior upsurges are afflictions that not only come from within the person but also emerge from the exterior trials of daily life. Nevertheless, 35 36 37 Perhaps, when “Jesus descended into hell,” he remained there not only to preach to the just in limbo of the just (which would have included his earthly adoptive father, St. Joseph), but also when visiting purgatory, perhaps he endured their fire, while explaining the good news of their future freedom to those there. If he did suffer the pains (a mere remote and speculative pious opinion neither taught nor condemned by the Church) and thereby identified with those in purgatory, he gave those undergoing this suffering consolation and deepened their certitude for heaven. See Aquinas Super 2 Cor 5, lec. 2, no. 169: “They please God by resisting evil. Hence he says, therefore, because our whole desire is to be present with God, we labor, i.e., we make great effort, i.e., we strive and fight against the temptations of the devil, the flesh and the world: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate’ (Luke 13:24). To please him, namely, God, with whom we desire to be present, whether we are at home or away: because unless we strive to please him in this life, while we are absent, we shall not be able to please him or be present with him in the other life: ‘There was one who pleased God and was loved by him’ (Wis 4:10)” (trans. Fabian Larcher, O.P. [Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012]). See De veritate, q. 26, a. 6, ad 17: “First movements do not have the complete nature of sin or demerit but are in a way dispositions for demerit just as venial sin is a disposition for mortal sin. The movements of sensuality themselves, then, do not have to be directly meritorious, because what is meritorious cannot be anything but a voluntary act, as has been said. But those passions are sometimes called vices or sins inasmuch as acts of the will or even habits are designated by the names of passions. Moreover, vices against nature are called passions even though they are voluntary acts, inasmuch as by such vices nature is disturbed from its proper order.” See also ST I-II, q. 91, a. 6. 26 Basil Cole, O.P. there is a call to steady one’s life course with the moral virtue of penance— satisfactory acts, namely, prayer, fasting, and works of mercy—which requires effort and its own hardship.38 The Virtue of Penance: Keeping Vigilance during Times of Temptation and Trials In the writings of Saint Thomas Aquinas, the word “punishment” occurs at least two thousand times and in the Catechism twenty-two times. In the Sacred Scriptures which Saint Thomas analyzes, this painful reality is connected to justice when God directly inflicts it.39 Finally, individuals must reasonably punish themselves in order to grow in the virtue of penance and thereby expand the theological and moral virtues in their lives. This is precisely what contrition or sorrow for sin is: For just as the inflation of one’s own will unto wrong-doing implies, in itself, a generic evil, so the utter undoing and crushing of that same will implies something generically good, for this is to detest one’s own will whereby sin was committed. Wherefore contrition, which signifies this, implies rectitude of the will; and so it is the act of that virtue to which it belongs to detest and destroy past sins, the act, to wit, of penance.40 38 39 40 See ST Suppl., q. 4, a. 4: “Since contrition, so far as it is a kind of displeasure seated in the rational appetite, is an act of the virtue of penance, there can never be excess in it, either as to its intensity, or as to its duration, except in so far as the act of one virtue hinders the act of another which is more urgent for the time being. Consequently, the more continually a man can perform acts of this displeasure, the better it is, provided he exercises the acts of other virtues when and how he ought to. On the other hand, passions can have excess and defect, both in intensity and in duration.” See SCG III, ch. 158, no. 5: “After a man has secured remission of his sin by grace and has been brought back to the state of grace, he remains under an obligation, as a result of God’s justice, to some penalty for the sin that he has committed. Now, if he imposes this penalty on himself by his own will, he is said to make satisfaction to God by this: inasmuch as he attains with labor and punishment the divinely established order by punishing himself for the sin, which order he had transgressed by sinning through following his own will. But, if he does not exact this penalty of himself, then, since things subject to divine providence cannot remain disordered, this penalty will be inflicted on him by God. Such a punishment is not called one of satisfaction, since it is not due to the choice of the one who suffers it; but it will be called purificatory, because through being punished by another he will be cleansed, as it were, until whatever disorder there was in him is brought back to proper order.” ST Suppl., q. 1, a. 2. St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 27 Making amends means doing works of penance called acts of satisfaction, namely, prayer, fasting, and the works of mercy.41 Sometimes, physical pains produced by natural causes are inflicted by a merciful and just God directly or through angels, or even demons by his permission, for many good purposes. The outcomes are good, though not always perceived, provided one cooperates with God’s assisting grace during any trials. Accepted punishments for false attitudes and intentions, errors in the mind, weaknesses in the will, as with souls in purgatory who willing accept their punishments, become purifications for someone who cooperates with grace. This cooperation then intensifies both the theological and moral virtues, by the inspirations of actual grace and even more with the gifts of the Holy Spirit.42 Another major teaching of the good news of punishment is the Passion and death of the Lord Jesus. Here, the Catechism reminds us that the many evils suffered by the Lord Jesus have wonderful effects on those who believe and ponder his extraordinary example in order to follow him by a life of virtue: §478. Jesus knew and loved us each and all during his life, his agony and his Passion, and gave himself up for each one of us: “The Son of God . . . loved me and gave himself for me” [Gal 2:20]. He has loved us all with a human heart. For this reason, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, pierced by our sins and for our salvation, “is quite rightly considered the chief sign and symbol of that . . . love with which the divine Redeemer continually loves the eternal Father and all human beings” without exception.43 §1505. Moved by so much suffering Christ not only allows himself to be touched by the sick, but he makes their miseries his own: 41 42 43 ST III, q. 27, a. 3. See CCC §1742: “The grace of Christ is not in the slightest way a rival of our freedom when this freedom accords with the sense of the true and the good that God has put in the human heart. On the contrary, as Christian experience attests especially in prayer, the more docile we are to the promptings of grace, the more we grow in inner freedom and confidence during trials, such as those we face in the pressures and constraints of the outer world. By the working of grace, the Holy Spirit educates us in spiritual freedom in order to make us free collaborators in his work in the Church and in the world: Almighty and merciful God, in your goodness take away from us all that is harmful, so that, made ready both in mind and body, we may freely accomplish your will.” CCC note 118: Pius XII, Haurietis Aquas (DS 3924; cf. DS 3812). 28 Basil Cole, O.P. “He took our infirmities and bore our diseases” [Matt 8:17; cf. Isa 53:4]. But he did not heal all the sick. His healings were signs of the coming of the Kingdom of God. They announced a more radical healing: the victory over sin and death through his Passover. On the cross Christ took upon himself the whole weight of evil and took away the “sin of the world” [John 1:29; cf. Isa 53:4–6], of which illness is only a consequence. By his passion and death on the cross Christ has given a new meaning to suffering: it can henceforth configure us to him and unite us with his redemptive Passion. Christological Insights into Suffering for Others From another perspective, virtuous suffering on the part of Jesus leads to a personal reconciliation with God objectively on behalf of humankind, but those who hear this teaching are required to appropriate that reconciliation in their own thoughts, words and good works: §615. “For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by one man’s obedience many will be made righteous” [Rom 5:19]. By his obedience unto death, Jesus accomplished the substitution of the suffering Servant, who “makes himself an offering for sin,” when “he bore the sin of many,” and who “shall make many to be accounted righteous,” for “he shall bear their iniquities” [Isa 53:10–12]. Jesus atoned for our faults and made satisfaction for our sins to the Father.44 The key that opens up the potential goodness of the physical or psychological evils of punishment, then, is cooperation with the graces that accompany such punishment. Such cooperation can either restore a relationship with God, or deepen an existing bond with God. Rebelling against punishment, on the contrary, can either cause someone to turn away from God or intensify one’s present distance from God even more. Also, one can so resist those graces as to hate God, and in the worst case, God may temporarily not give grace to those who undergo suffering, if they do not want his help. This latter situation exists when particular individuals have become “hardened of heart” by their love of sin.45 Never44 45 CCC note 445: see Council of Trent (DS 1529). See ST I-II, q. 79, a. 3: “Spiritual blindness and hardness of heart signify two things: One of them is a movement of the human soul when it adheres to evil and is turned away from God’s light. And in this respect God is not a cause of spiritual blindness and of hardness of heart. However, the other one is the withholding of St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 29 theless, given the fact that human beings do not have angelic intellects and wills, so as to make absolute and definitive choices, often after much pain and suffering, those in a state of resistance may turn to God out of desperation and repent of an entire life of sin as a pure gift from God. This why Saint Thomas teaches that “God allows some to fall into sin so that, acknowledging their own sin, they might become humble and be converted, as Augustine says in De natura et gratia.”46 Further, as a consequence of one friend’s suffering for another, God may give graces of repentance to a great sinner to turn away from sin and adhere to God’s offer of friendship. Saint Thomas has something insightful to say about this aspect of suffering for others: It is written (Gal 6:2): “Bear ye one another’s burdens.” Therefore, it seems that one can bear the burden of punishment laid upon another. Further, charity avails more before God than before man. Now before man, one can pay another’s debt for love of him. Much more, therefore, can this be done before the judgment seat of God.47 Why “much more”? The power of charity or divine love in the soul has a certain efficacy when it comes to suffering for others. As Aquinas teaches: Now, what we do by our friends, we do apparently by ourselves: because friendship, especially the love of charity, binds two persons together as one. Wherefore as a man can satisfy God by himself, so can he by another; especially when there is urgent need for it. For a man looks upon the punishment which his friend suffers for his sake, as though he suffered it himself: and so he is not without punishment, seeing that he suffers with his suffering friend, and he suffers all the more, according as he is the cause of his friend’s suffering. Again, the love of charity in him who suffers for his friend makes the satisfaction more acceptable to God, than if he suffered for himself: for the former comes of the eagerness of charity, but the latter comes of necessity. Hence we infer that one man may satisfy for another, so long as both remain in charity: wherefore the Apostle says (Gal 6:2): “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so ye shall fulfil the law of Christ.” . . . But this is by way of merit rather than of satisfaction. On the other hand, as regards the payment of the debt, one man can satisfy for another, 46 47 grace, from which it follows that the mind is not divinely illuminated in order to live in an upright way and that the man’s heart is not softened in order to live in an upright way. And in this respect God is a cause of spiritual blindness and hardness of heart.” ST I-II, q. 79, a. 4. ST Suppl., q. 13, a. 2, sc. 30 Basil Cole, O.P. provided he be in a state of charity, so that his works may avail for satisfaction. Nor is it necessary that he who satisfies for another should undergo a greater punishment than the principal would have to undergo (as some maintain, who argue that a man profits more by his own punishment than by another’s), because punishment derives its power of satisfaction chiefly from charity whereby man bears it. And since greater charity is evidenced by a man satisfying for another than for himself, less punishment is required of him who satisfies for another, than of the principal: wherefore we read in the Lives of the Fathers (5.5) of one who for love of his brother did penance for a sin which his brother had not committed, and that on account of his charity his brother was released from a sin which he had committed. Nor is it necessary that the one for whom satisfaction is made should be unable to make satisfaction himself, for even if he were able, he would be released from his debt when the other satisfied in his stead.48 At the heart of punishment in general is God’s justice and his rights over human persons. Humankind’s unreasonable tendency to choose the goods of life against the law of God leads to punishments, either temporarily in this life (though not always) or eternally in the next life, or both. The Catechism explains this in the context of indulgences: §1472. To understand this doctrine and practice of the Church, it is necessary to understand that sin has a double consequence. Grave sin deprives us of communion with God and therefore makes us incapable of eternal life, the privation of which is called the “eternal punishment” of sin. On the other hand, every sin, even venial, entails an unhealthy attachment to creatures, which must be purified either here on earth, or after death in the state called Purgatory [emphasis mine]. This purification frees one from what is called the “temporal punishment” of sin. These two punishments must not be conceived of as a kind of vengeance inflicted by God from without, but as following from the very nature of sin. A conversion which proceeds from a fervent charity can attain the complete purification of the sinner in such a way that no punishment would remain.49 On the other hand, punishment can be reasonably self-inflicted with ascetical practices such as prolonging prayer instead of wasting time on 48 49 SCG III, ch. 158. CCC note 83: See Council of Trent (DS 1712–713; DS 1820). St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 31 the internet, fasting or eating unappetizing foods, accepting harsh weather conditions, or depriving oneself of sleep.50 Doing personal penance makes satisfaction for previous sin. This can include the works of mercy (corporal and spiritual).51 These works are meant to inflict some kind of penalty on self in addition to helping others, so as to rectify the disorders introduced into one’s spiritual faculties, be it the intellect adhering to error, or the will weakened to follow right reason and faith, or the passions charming one away from reason and faith.52 Restoring and/or strengthening virtuous behavior and rebuilding good moral habits and dispositions is one of the goals of penance. One is attempting to prevent oneself from disobeying God’s precepts. This sums up the ascetical life of Christians who wish to grow in their intimacy with God, since sin violates God’s rights over humankind. The Church attempts to help her children grow in this virtue of making satisfaction for past sinning by reminding the people of God of the obligation of doing penance, especially on the Fridays of the year and during Lent (some might include Advent as well).53 Looked at from a positive point of view, the virtue of penance looks to the rehabilitation of one’s inner self by restoring the faculties and appetites that have become blinded, weakened, and enslaved to sin. As one grows and sustains this virtue of penance, so one is restored in grace and virtue, which incorporates the divine theological virtues into the properties of the soul (intellect and will), and promotes a stronger presence of the 50 51 52 53 See Super Iob 8, lec. 1, where Thomas Aquinas maintains that prayer is at the forefront of the works of satisfaction. ST III, q. 27, a. 3. See SCG III, ch. 158: “By this, then, it becomes evident that, after a man has secured remission of his sin by grace and has been brought back to the state of grace, he remains under an obligation, as a result of God’s justice, to some penalty for the sin that he has committed. Now, if he imposes this penalty on himself by his own will, he is said to make satisfaction to God by this: inasmuch as he attains with labor and punishment the divinely established order by punishing himself for the sin, which order he had transgressed by sinning through following his own will. But, if he does not exact this penalty of himself, then, since things subject to divine providence cannot remain disordered, this penalty will be inflicted on him by God. Such a punishment is not called one of satisfaction, since it is not due to the choice of the one who suffers it; but it will be called purificatory, because through being punished by another he will be cleansed, as it were, until whatever disorder there was in him is brought back to proper order. Hence, there is this statement of the Apostle in 1 Corinthians (11:31–32): ‘if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged, but whilst we are judged, we are chastised by the Lord, that we be not condemned with this world.’” See Codex Iuris Canonici (1983), §§839, 1245, 1249–50, 1252. 32 Basil Cole, O.P. indwelling of the Trinity in the depths of the soul. During this journey, these efforts are sustained by grace intensified by prayer, reception of the sacrament of penance and the fervent offering of Mass and reception of Holy Communion. The question is, does God punish? It seems for a Catholic to be obvious, since the word in Greek and Hebrew is used throughout the Old and New Testaments. However, the final and even the efficient cause of the punishment can be obscure. On a personal level, punishment eliminates the leftovers or dregs of forgiven sin. As the Catechism teaches concerning the virtue of penance, punishment relates to restoring one’s inner personal life: §1473. The forgiveness of sin and restoration of communion with God entail the remission of the eternal punishment of sin, but temporal punishment of sin remains. While patiently bearing sufferings and trials of all kinds and, when the day comes, serenely facing death, the Christian must strive to accept this temporal punishment of sin as a grace. He should strive by works of mercy and charity, as well as by prayer and the various practices of penance, to put off completely the “old man” and to put on the “new man” [Eph 4:22, 24]. Conclusion If God had chosen not to create other beings of a spiritual nature such as angels and humans there would be no need for punishment, nor would the justice and mercy of God be activated. Punishment consists of painful realities that go contrary to one’s will, such as physical pain and/or psychological sorrow and fear.54 The good news of punishment is relative because it is a mixed reality, both good and bad, though not on the same level as moral evil. It is a consequence of moral evil, whether personal or derived from original sin, or (in very special cases) permitted by God for someone to endure as a victim soul for the sake of the salvation of others who are not disposed and so cannot receive the usual graces of conversion or re-conversion in their present state of mind and heart. The Passion and 54 See ST I-II, q. 87, a. 2: “For the act of sinning renders a man deserving of punishment insofar as he is transgressing the order of God’s justice, and he does not return to that order except through some sort of compensatory punishment, which leads him back to the equality of justice. More specifically, someone who has indulged his own will more than he should, acting contrary to God’s commandment, must, in accord with the order of God’s justice, undergo, whether willingly or unwillingly, something contrary to what he wills.” St. Thomas and the "Good News" of Punishment 33 death of Jesus are necessary precisely because no human being can forgive sins, bestow heaven, or repair the damage due to sin. There is a kind of just punishment that is merciful because it is accepted as a way to share in the mystery of redemption, that is, suffering for others to pay their debt to God for sinning against him. One and only one kind of punishment lasts eternally, that is damnation both physical (the mysterious fire) and mental (anguish at the loss of ultimate happiness).55 All other punishments are endured temporally, sometimes prolonged even until death (such as fatal illnesses), other times more or less so, with many degrees within that spectrum of the life of a person or even a nation. Some punishments are inflicted by deleterious circumstances (such as corrupt or tyrannical governments), others by God with the help of his angels and occasionally demons, for reasons known only to God, and others by the moral corruption of peoples, as can be known in principle by faith. Some punishments come from mistaken choices due to ignorance, or lack of experience, or new circumstances that have painful consequences. These reverses of good fortune may come about through acts such as eating certain foods that are toxic for some bodies (allergies), or making bad investments that lead to destitution, with its sorrows, fears, and worries, Others come about from situations where one is not in control, such as being stranded for days in airports during major snow storms, or falsely incarcerated for crimes not committed. These examples can be multiplied exponentially. No matter what bad things happen to the followers of the Lord Jesus, the good news is that with his assistance in this life, they can become occasions of grace and greater union with him. Knowing about the absolute punishment of damnation also is good news because it is always a timely warning when facing grave temptations against the way to heaven. While this sector of good news is not immediately consoling, it is however realistic and, when pondered in light of the other aspects of faith, keeps one from becoming lukewarm and induces one to keep up the struggle for the N&V sight of the Triune God. 55 For St. Thomas, the punishment of the babies in limbo is something objective, namely, not being able to possess supreme happiness, but in no way do they suffer any pain and therefore possess a natural happiness, unless God chooses to bring them to the beatific vision in another way unknown at this time since this possibility has not been revealed. See my article “Is Limbo Ready to be Abolished?,” Nova et Vetera (English) 6, no. 2 (2008): 403–18. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 35–50 35 Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement Michael Brungardt St. Paul Parish Lyons, KS In our time and cultural milieu, it appears that any engagement with the topic of gender and gender dysphoria is threatened to be shut down before it is allowed to begin. This is due in large part to the fact that proponents of gender theory are often unwilling to engage in dialogue; one’s propositions are shut down before they are allowed to begin. In a moment of self-reflection, however, this shutdown can often be the case because the propositions proffered are “canned,” reductive, and to be honest, uncharitable and insensitive. It is my hope to go deeper into the issue in a way that allows for a truly Christian proposal to a situation so often marked by confusion and frustration. In its 2019 document on the subject, titled “Male and Female He Created Them”: Towards a Path of Dialogue on the Question of Gender Theory in Education, the Vatican’s Congregation for Catholic Education (CCE) proposed a three-step method which it believes to be “best-suited to meet the needs of both individuals and communities: to listen, to reason and to propose” (§5). This threefold method mimics that employed by Thomas Aquinas in his Summa theologiae. One begins by listening: truly listening to one’s interlocutor, so that one can make the opposing side’s argument without making a straw man out of it, tell the other side of the story, and understand and represent the other’s view. One then engages in a process of reasoning: providing a grounding and rationale for one’s own position. Finally, one is then ready to propose a response: in light of one’s listening and reasoning, a truly Christian proposition can be offered. Why does the Vatican’s CCE believe this method to be the path forward? The danger we face is to never truly listen to the experience of real people, 36 Michael Brungardt to remain in the realm of ideas and abstractions, and consequently to offer “canned” responses that sidestep reality. John Henry Newman, in his Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent, is famous on this point. Newman points out against his “ghost interlocutor,” John Locke, that the “truth,” evidence, and mere facts are not enough to change minds and hearts. While Locke would argue that we assent to a certain proposition due to the degrees of evidence (see An Essay Concerning Human Understanding), Newman points out that this is invalidated by our experience. There are many things we believe (and believe quite strongly) without much evidence at all. Furthermore, wonderful rational arguments and perfect syllogisms often fail to convince people. Why is this? Because, as Newman argues, assent to the truth is based on more than “the truth.” As Robert Barron explains Newman, “We rarely ever settle a matter based on formal, thorough, and clinching argumentation. We come to assent to the truth based on the totality of experience.”1 This is all to say that giving a response to the transgender movement based on theological abstractions, canned answers, and “pull quotes,” such as Genesis 1:27, is insufficient and unhelpful. As others have made clear in this publication and others, the true issue is not a problem of science, biology, or medicine. The data and following conclusions from these sources seem relatively clear if one is intellectually honest.2 What is important to this discussion, and to any Christian searching for a response, is the “issue” of our experience, the “totality of experience.” As it will hopefully be made clear in the course of this paper, the problem is not “man versus woman.” The “problem” is us—our common humanity.3 The cry of the person struggling with gender dysphoria or advocating for “new rights” for people who 1 2 3 Bishop Robert Barron, “Bishop Barron’s Lecture from Oxford University: ‘Newman and the New Evangelization,’” October 23, 2019, video, 55:03, youtube.com/watch?v=cP_eL7FiIXk. For instance, see: Paul W. Hruz, “The Use of Cross-Sex Steroids in the Treatment of Gender Dysphoria,” The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 17, no. 4 (2017): 661–71; Thomas Heyne, Nancy Hernandez, and Lisa Gilbert, “A Catholic Approach to Adolescent Medicine,” The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 19, no. 1 (2019): 63–88; Hruz, “Experimental Approaches to Alleviating Gender Dysphoria in Children,” The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 19, no. 1 (2019): 89–104; Lawrence Mayer and Paul McHugh, Sexuality and Gender: Findings from the Biological, Psychological, and Social Sciences, special-report issue, The New Atlantis 50 (Fall 2016). I use “problem” in its original Greek etymology, which refers to something that we need to hold before our eyes in order to make sense of the world. See Luigi Giussani, The Risk of Education: Discovering Our Ultimate Destiny, trans. Mariangela Sullivan (Montréal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2019), 70. Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement 37 identify as transgender, gender fluid, gender queer, and so on—the cry of these persons, the cry of their heart, is the cry of our heart, our common humanity. Their cry is our cry. Listen: The Battle Cry of the Transgender Movement, the CryingOut of a Constrained Humanity: Identity, Freedom, and Belonging Pope Francis recently exhorted, “How important it is to feel challenged by the questions of the men and women of today! Without . . . giving pre-packaged answers.”4 On the topic of gender dysphoria we often want to give the pre-packaged answer of Genesis 1:27, “God made them male and female.” We want answers that make this issue black and white, simple, and a non-issue. The challenge for us who think this way, then, is first and foremost to combat within ourselves this tendency to give pre-packaged answers, answers which do not truly respond to what is actually at issue. In other words, the challenge we face, before beginning to proffer our own ideology into the echo chamber of a like-minded audience, and before spouting reasons and responses to our own ideas of what we assume the issue to be, is to first listen to experience. Listening to Personal Experiences This section of listening begins with a disclaimer. I am taking for granted a general familiarity with current cultural, political, and medical debates surrounding gender, gender dysphoria, and people who identify as transgender or somewhere other than “male” or “female” along what is called the “gender spectrum.” It is beyond the scope of this discussion to lay out all of the background information.5 Rather, focus will be given to the testimony of actual people who identify as transgender. As I listened to hours of videos of people giving their testimony about their experience of identifying as transgender, three underlying elements of experience continued to stand out to me: identity, freedom, and belonging.6 With regard to the experience of identity, listen to these experiences as examples. One person (a biological female currently identifying as a male) 4 5 6 Pope Francis, Address to Participants in the International Meeting for Academic Centers and Schools of the New Evangelization, September 21, 2019. I would refer readers to the book by Ryan T. Anderson, When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment (New York: Encounter, 2018), which gives a helpful overview of the topic. An integral part of this article came from spending close to fifteen hours listening to people who identify as transgender share their stories and experience. This was accomplished primarily through YouTube videos, but also through written testimonies. 38 Michael Brungardt says: “[My dad] needed me to be straight, Christian, and a woman, . . . and I’m none of those things. All my life I wanted his love and acceptance, but I didn’t feel like I could have it.” 7 This person does not experience their identity as conforming to the categories supplied by their father. What is more, they express an experience of not feeling loved and accepted, but also far worse, the feeling of not being able to be loved or accepted by their own father. Another person says, “The problem was I never really felt like [a girl]. But in our society, gender isn’t about how you feel, it’s about how we look. It’s assigned to us . . . based solely on what’s between our legs.”8 In this testimony, you can almost feel the experience this person has of having an identity imposed on them, an identity which they experience as completely foreign. While more examples could be given, what these examples typify is the element of identity mentioned above. People who identify as transgender often feel that an aspect of their identity is being imposed on them from the outside based purely on how others view them, and their own personal experience of this element of identity is being denied. No one likes when their experience is denied, much less flippantly cast aside, and so this must be taken seriously regardless of one’s own position on the issue. With regard to the experience of freedom, listen to these examples. One person says: “Our world is set-up to keep us in these two boxes [indicates the words “male” and “female” on a screen]. But why? . . . Imagine a world where gender isn’t left up to doctors or judges, one where we’re all able to claim our own gender based on what’s between our ears.”9 This person feels their freedom being constrained and limited; they are “boxed in” by others (specifically, by the categories given by others who do not seem to understand their experience in the first place). Another person says: “I refuse to identify myself as male or female, as man or woman. . . . Gender expression and gender identity are two separate things. . . . Isn’t everything subject to change?”10 This exemplifies a very common experience of people who identify as transgender, namely, that there is a great desire to have the freedom to choose one’s own identity, to determine one’s own path, and to 7 8 9 10 SoulPancake, “Trans Men Share What It’s Like to Come Out as Transgender | Tell A Stranger,” June 19, 2019, video, 12:06, youtube.com/ watch?v=sBOOER0gPi4&t=537s. The Columbus Foundation, “Hey Doc, Some Boys Are Born Girls: Decker Moss at TEDxColumbus [independently organized TED event],” December 11, 2013, video, 17:02, youtube.com/watch?v=nOmstbKVebM&list=PLMlGwCEtvcMsLB7gNTJl af12moWse-ShV. Columbus Foundation, “Hey Doc.” Good Morning Britain, “Should Piers Morgan Be Fired for His Views on Gender?,” October 15, 2019, video, 13.56, youtube.com/watch?v=C1roM98Dass&t=101s. Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement 39 not be boxed in by others. It is a desire to feel a greater sense of freedom. Finally, with regard to the experience of belonging, listen to these experiences. One person shares: “Maybe you’ll get to the point someday that you’ll see that I’m a person, not a sexuality. . . . I have kinda found this small community of people that, they see me for all of me not just one part or the other.”11 Another says: “Being trans is awkward because everyone else gets awkward when they’re around me.”12 And finally: “Imagine a world where you walk up to the ticket agent, and instead of saying, ‘Enjoy the event, sir or ma’am,’ they say, ‘Enjoy the event, my friend.’”13 What do all of these experiences have in common? A deep, ineradicable yearning for belonging. In summary, there is a sense among people who identify as transgender that their identity is under attack, their freedom is being constrained, and they have no sense of belonging in wider society (or even within their own families). And so what can we conclude from this? We have brothers and sisters who are suffering, profoundly suffering. Listening Closely The philosopher Charles Taylor points out that we live in the “age of authenticity.”14 We live in a time in which we see ourselves on a journey to make meaning, to be loyal to what speaks to us and to what engages us: to be our “authentic self.”15 Anecdotally, one of the most common (as well as the most damning) insults that young people give these days is the pejorative “fake”: “You’re fake,” or, “You’re a fake person.” In other words, they are calling the person out for a lack of integrity and authenticity. For example, if you say one thing to one person but another thing to another, you are “fake.” Or if you are my friend in front of me but my enemy behind me, you are “fake.” So why are the people of this age, specifically those who identify as transgender, suffering? It is because this authenticity they seek seems impossible to achieve. “I can’t be authentically myself. I can’t really be free. I can’t 11 12 13 14 15 SoulPancake, “LGBT People Share Their Experience Being Rejected by the Church | Tell A Stranger,” June 13, 2019, video, 7:59, youtube.com/ watch?v=5TmqytFxsVY. TED, “How to talk (and listen) to transgender people | Jackson Bird,” December 5, 2017, video, 6:24, youtube.com/watch?v=HbQZ7jAvgoI. Columbus Foundation, “Hey Doc.” Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 2007), 473–504 (ch. 13: “The Age of Authenticity”). See Andrew Root, Faith Formation in a Secular Age: Responding to the Church’s Obsession with Youthfulness (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2017), 3–15. 40 Michael Brungardt truly be accepted.” Many psychoanalysts believe that the greatest cause of anguish among youth today is the suffering brought on by nihilism, precisely because the places in which they are searching for meaning (and consequently lack an experience of meaning) are constantly threatened to collapse. “Young people today are not well. . . . They lack purpose. For them, the future has changed from promising to threatening.”16 As I listen, what strikes me is that the problem here does not concern “gender” as such, but the experience that, “I cannot truly be myself,” “I will never be fulfilled,” “there is no point,” “the future has nothing for me.” The problem is this sense of nihilism. What is the evidence for this? For example, in the past ten years, the suicide rate has risen 56% among youth.17 Among persons identifying as transgender, 40% of adults reported having made a suicide attempt at least once in their lifetime, and 92% of these individuals did so before the age of twenty-five.18 Within one year of beginning ministry as a diocesan priest, I had two children from my parish (of only eight hundred families) attempt suicide. One of them was successful. It is into this “void of meaning” that the “secular religion” of ideology, in this instance gender ideology, has taken up residence.19 Pope Francis himself refers to “gender theory” as a form of “ideological colonization.”20 16 17 18 19 20 Umberto Galimberti, “A 18 anni via da casa: ci vuole un servizio civile di 12 mesi [Out of the House at 18: What’s Needed Is Twelve Months of Civil Service],” interview by Stephano Lorenzetto, Corriere della Sera, September 15, 2019, corriere.it/cronache/19_settembre_13/a-18-anni-via-casa-ci-vuoleun-servizio-civile-12-mesi-5e8e05f0-d65b-11e9-8d78-c16bbb32544a.shtml. Sally C. Curtin and Melanie Heron, Death Rates Due to Suicide and Homicide among Persons Aged 10–24: United States, 2000–2017, NCHS Data Brief no. 352 (October 2019), 1–2: “The suicide rate among persons aged 10–24 was stable from 2000 to 2007, and then increased 56% between 2007 (6.8 per 100,000) and 2017.” S. E. James, J. L. Herman, S. Rankin, M. Keisling, L. Mottet, and M. Anafi, The Report of the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey (Washington, DC: National Center for Transgender Equality, 2016), 5, 15. On the topic of ideology inserting itself into our current void of meaning, see John Waters, “The Human Person: State of Emergency,” the Rimini Meeting, August 20, 2013, video, 1:27:02, youtube.com/watch?v=8u0sSc1NIeg. Pope Francis, Address to the Polish Bishops, July 27, 2016, “In Europe, America, Latin America, Africa, and in some countries of Asia, there are genuine forms of ideological colonization taking place. And one of these—I will call it clearly by its name—is [the ideology of] ‘gender.’ Today children—children!—are taught in school that everyone can choose his or her sex. Why are they teaching this? Because the books are provided by the persons and institutions that give you money. These forms of ideological colonization are also supported by influential countries.” Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement 41 In a world marked by this nihilism, “ideology has a certain hypnotic charm,” claims John Waters. The reason being that, if you accept the ideology, life becomes calm, “meaning” seems restored, and unanswered mysteries, questions, and anxieties vanish.21 While we would love to believe that the totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century are over, many of us have succumb to the new tyranny, the new dictatorship, of ideology. The objection quickly raised is: “How, in a Western Democratic society, with all of our rights and freedoms, could we possibly be experiencing a dictatorship?”22 And the answer is that we have accepted a reduced form of freedom: we have accepted the idea of freedom as “rights.” The more “rights” I have, the more I am truly free. Julian Carrón explains it this way: The multiplication of individual rights expresses the expectation that the juridical system can resolve these human dramas and ensure satisfaction of the infinite needs that dwell in the human heart. . . . This culture carries within itself the conviction that the attainment of more and more new rights constitutes the path to the fulfillment of the person. . . . [The contemporary world] proposes . . . the infinite multiplication of partial answers.23 Listen to the arguments for abortion, euthanasia, gay marriage, and so on: they are all framed as the pursuit of “rights.” On the surface, there appears to be no difference with those who promote granting new “rights” to people who identify as transgender. What the person who identifies as transgender has been told, implicitly and explicitly, is: you cannot be yourself, you cannot be free, and you do not belong. And so, along the same lines as the social movements before them, they have banded together as a group in search of their “rights.” As I listen, however, what I hear from the transgender movement is not really a cry for new “rights,” but the cry of a suppressed and reduced humanity, a reduced and suppressed heart. But this is the cry of every human heart—it is no different from the cry of your heart, of my heart. In essence, the transgender movement is revealing us to ourselves. While most of us do not struggle with the expression of our gender, we do share the same humanity, and thus the same cry in the depth of our heart. This “transgender movement” is, then, not original. It is the issue of Adam and Eve: tired of dependence on the Creator, we seek to strike out 21 22 23 Waters, “The Human Person.” Waters, “The Human Person.” Julián Carrón, Disarming Beauty: Essays on Faith, Truth, and Freedom (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2017), 11–12. 42 Michael Brungardt alone.24 Pope emeritus Benedict calls our time “the age of [rejection of] God the Creator,” and Pope Francis encourages us to think about the transgender issue in this way: a rejection of God as Creator.25 Reason: Christ Came as a Response to the Cry of the Human Heart: A Christian Anthropology in the Transgender Movement26 A discussion of the Christian response to the transgender movement that claims as its frame of reference “God as Creator” would most likely be presumed to develop from the starting point of the creation texts of Genesis, and there from Genesis 1:27—“Male and female he created them.” And while that would be convenient, it would not be particularly helpful. It is unhelpful precisely because Christian anthropology does not begin with Genesis, but with Jesus Christ. In the beginning God created—male and female he created, true, but “in the beginning was the Word” ( John 1:1). In point of fact, Christianity makes the distinct claim that Jesus Christ “is the image [eikon] of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation” (Colossians 1:5). While the whole Judeo-Christian tradition would calmly ascribe to the claim that mankind is created in the image of God (per Gen 1:26–27), it is only Christianity that makes the bold claim that mankind is created in the image of Jesus Christ.27 Consequently, it is this claim that dictates that humanity must be, and in fact can only be, fully understood through the image (eikon) or “lens” of Jesus Christ. Furthermore, the claim continues: we not only are able to understand our humanity through 24 25 26 27 Waters, “The Human Person.” Pope Francis, Address to the Polish Bishops. The Christological insights drawn out in this section are indebted to Robert Barron’s illumination and exposition of these key elements of Christian anthropology. See, for instance, “What is Faith,” DCC Lecture Series, March 20, 2015, video, 1:19:07, youtube.com/watch?v=dp21zP50cSE&t=3046s, and Exploring Catholic Theology: Essays on God, Liturgy, and Evangelization (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 205). I would also highly recommend Paul O’Callaghan’s masterwork on Christian anthropology, Children of God in the World (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2016). Far from being a “new” theological idea, this idea is rather ancient. Irenaeus of Lyons, a disciple of Polycarp, who was a student of John the Apostle and Evangelist, argues that we are created in the image of the Incarnate Son of God. As Matthew Steenberg notes, “Irenaeus called Christ ‘Adam’ because Christ is the image in which Adam was fashioned—he is ‘in person’ that which the whole race is as eikon [image]” (Of God and Man: Theology as Anthropology from Irenaeus to Athanasius [New York: T&T Clark, 2009], 29). And further, “It is in the incarnate and resurrected Christ that the fabric of humanity, the nature of the human person and the economy of human existence all are to be understood” (51). Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement 43 Jesus Christ, but are capable of sharing and participating in the fullness of humanity which he embodies (see Col 2:9–10). Or, as the patristic dictum pithily yet profoundly states, “Deus fit homo ut homo fieret Deus” (“God became man so that man might become God”). These are the fundamental claims of Christian anthropology. And it was these claims that were in the mind of the Church at the Second Vatican Council when it proclaimed: The truth is that only in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light. For Adam, the first man, was a figure of Him Who was to come, namely Christ the Lord. Christ, the final Adam, by the revelation of the mystery of the Father and His love, fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear. It is not surprising, then, that in Him all the aforementioned truths find their root and attain their crown.28 These central claims of Christianity concerning Jesus Christ form the foundation for all reasoning within the realm of Christian anthropology. In fact, Christian tradition continued time and again to affirm and bolster these claims, specifying and expounding on their significance. The Nicene-Constantinopolitan claim that Jesus Christ is true God and true man, fully divine and fully human, is not to be set aside as a mere doctrinal nicety that plays no role in reasoning on anthropology or modern moral issues.29 The Chalcedonic claim that Jesus Christ “must be acknowledged in two natures without confusion or change, without division or separation,”30 is not to be thought of as an abstract dogmatic formula that plays no part in our reasoning. Far from it. If Jesus Christ is who Christianity claims him to be, then he must be the sine qua non of reasoning on this pressing question of the transgender movement. Thus, if the real matter at hand in the transgender movement is, as has been claimed, that “I cannot truly be myself, I cannot be authentically me, I cannot be authentically human,” then a helpful and specifically “Christian” response to these anthropological questions must propose Jesus Christ. It is Jesus Christ who reveals to us our authentic humanity, and it is Jesus Christ who gives us the ability to attain it. In keeping with this, 28 29 30 Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes (1965), §22. For this affirmation see the Constantinopolitan Creed (381) in Enchiridion Symbolorum: Compendium of Creeds, Definitions, and Declarations on Matters of Faith and Morals, ed. Heinrich Denzinger and Peter Hünermann, 43rd ed. [DH], English ed. Robert Fastiggi and Anne Englund Nash (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2012), pp. 65–66. The Chalcedonian Creed (DH, p. 109). 44 Michael Brungardt then, let us again use the three elements of identity, freedom, and belonging to examine what it is that Jesus Christ reveals about and makes possible for our human condition. Identity With regard to identity, Jesus Christ reveals that God is not in some type of competitive relationship with our humanity.31 In our experience, two things cannot exist in the same space, at the same time, and in the same respect. For example: I can sit in your chair, but only by supplanting you; I can become a physical adult, but only by first leaving childhood behind; the log can become ash, but only by being burned. There is, by necessity, a “competitiveness” between beings. But that is not the case with God. Think for a minute of the image of the burning bush in Exodus 3:2. When God comes close, the bush is on fire but not consumed. When God comes close, the natural is not consumed but enflamed, made radiant, more fully alive.32 In Jesus Christ, God becomes man, humanity and divinity are united in a single person, God comes close. And as God “comes close,” we see the image (the icon, if you will) of one who is fully human. The divinity of Jesus does not supplant the humanity (i.e., Nestorianism), nor is Jesus a super-human specially blessed by God (i.e., Arianism). Rather, as orthodox Christianity claims, Jesus Christ is fully human and fully divine. Recall the affirmation of the Church at the Council of Chalcedon, that Jesus Christ is “perfect in divinity and perfect in humanity, . . . truly God and truly man, . . . acknowledged in two natures, without confusion or change, without division or separation.”33 What this means is that God does not have to dominate, supplant, or “burn up” our humanity in order to bring it to its fullness; he does not exist in competition with us or our humanity. Rather, our identity, our entire humanity, is brought more fully to life the closer God comes. We become “more truly ourselves” when God comes close. Like the burning bush, our humanity is not burned up, but made radiant and brought fully to life. Thus, as we are made in the image of God and specifically the image of the Incarnate Son of God, Jesus Christ reveals that our authentic iden- 31 32 33 See Robert Sokolowski’s concept of God’s “non-competitive transcendence” as explicated in Barron, Exploring Catholic Theology, 33–35 and 111. The employment of this image of the burning bush in this topic was borrowed Barron, “What is Faith.” The Chalcedonian Creed. Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement 45 tity, the authentic flourishing of our humanity, is found only in relation, proximity, and adhesion to God. Freedom The topic of freedom is contentious, to say the least. As good Americans, we tend to think of freedom as our founding fathers did: the overthrowing of oppressive outside rule in exchange for autonomy and “government by the people,” the ability to choose without constraint and do what we want. Indebted in no small part to Immanuel Kant, this view holds that freedom is autonomy or self-determination and flows from the casting off of heteronomy (law imposed on one from the outside). Thus, in a common caricature of him, God is construed as an imposing lawgiver, and as such is necessarily a threat to one’s freedom. This argument, however, is good only if one subscribes to this typically American and Kantian understanding of freedom. Throughout the tradition of Western and Christian thought, others have posited the concept of freedom not merely as unrestricted self-determination or the ability to choose between “option A” and “option B,” but as the ability for excellence: the ability to do the good with ease and without impediment. For example, take playing the cello. When I first picked up the instrument, I could not make any sound that resembled music. I had to submit myself to a teacher, long hours of study and practice, and learning all of the “rules” and “laws” of playing the cello. As I began to absorb those laws, I became more free to play the cello. In fact, these laws are now so deeply ingrained within me, playing the cello is “second nature” (a nature that is non-competitive to me). Did my teacher’s heteronomous methods impinge upon my freedom? No. Rather, they kindled and ignited my freedom! This is freedom understood in its proper context: not as the overthrowing of all rules and laws, but as clinging to and embodying these laws which (somewhat paradoxically) “freed” me to play the cello.34 Sparing you the history of the seventh-century Christological controversy of Monothelitism, orthodox Christians hold to the belief that Jesus Christ possesses two wills or freedoms (thelēma in Greek and voluntas in Latin): one human and one divine. That is to say, in the person of Jesus Christ there is a play between a finite (human) freedom and an infinite (divine) freedom. In Jesus Christ, then, we see that human freedom is not limited, restricted, or “burnt up” by God coming close, but enhanced. 34 For more on this see Servais Pinckaers, The Sources of Christian Ethics, trans. Mary Thomas Noble (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1995), 354–56. 46 Michael Brungardt To reference an earlier point: the human will and the divine will are in a non-competitive relationship.35 What this means for us is that when God comes close—when Jesus Christ, the Law incarnate comes close, and I participate in his life—I become more fully alive and my freedom is ignited (again, think of the burning bush). That is why Saint Paul calls himself the doulos Christou Iēsu, the “slave of Christ Jesus” (Rom 1:1). As humans created in the image of God, the full flourishing of our freedom comes not from autonomy (doing whatever we want), but adhesion to Jesus Christ. Belonging Finally, and briefly, we touch on the theme of belonging. One key element of Jesus’s ministry and mission as Messiah was to inaugurate the gathering of the tribes of Israel. Yet his ministry and mission did not end there. As the “new Adam” (see Rom 5), his mission extended to gathering all the nations of the world, the whole of creation. God’s plan, since the fall of man in the beginning, was a great rescue mission, a mission of “gathering in.” Notice how Jesus’s mission always involved seeking out and saving the lost (Luke 19:10). Jesus was always found welcoming sinners and eating with them (Luke 15:2). In Pope Francis’s words, Jesus constantly goes to the peripheries. Granted, the reason he does this is multi-layered, but suffice it to say that it is a prefiguration of the fact that his mission is for all. Again, it is Saint Paul who concludes, “Christ died for all” (2 Corinthians 5:15), and, “In Christ Jesus you are all sons of God. . . . In Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female” (Galatians 3:26). Or as Saint John declares, “See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are” (1 John 3:1). It can sound idealistic, and at times it is undoubtedly difficult to see this lived out in practice, but the fact of the matter is that in and through Jesus Christ all belong. Thus, as humans created in the image of God, our belonging stems from the fact that we possess the capacity of sharing in the redeemed and renewed humanity of Jesus Christ, the New Adam. All of this is to say that Christ comes as a response to the authentic cries of the human heart. In terms of identity, Jesus Christ proposes that our identity is found in relation to God and that we become more authentically human and “ourselves” the closer we are to him. In terms of freedom, Christ proposes that authentic human freedom is found in relation to divine freedom and that our finite human freedom is enhanced and brought alive by contact with the divine. In terms of belonging, Christ 35 Barron, “What is Faith.” Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement 47 proposes that, through him, with him, and in him, all of creation is gathered back into one, that we become children of God. Propose: Crying with Them: The Compassionate Christian Response of Witness and Accompaniment By way of review, the problem is not the issue of man versus woman, it is deeper than that. As we listened, we discovered that the youth in general, and the transgender person in particular, are having their “experience of living” called into question. Their identity, freedom, and sense of belonging are called into question. And more than that, they are suffering profoundly because of their inability to live the authenticity they seek. The issue presents itself as “gender dysphoria,” but upon closer examination it is the void created by an inability to be their “authentic selves.” It is into this void of meaning that the secular religion of ideology has inserted itself. Instead of the suffering leading them deeper into the mystery of themselves, it has led them instead to grasp for a reduced form of freedom, freedom as “rights.” The cry for “new rights” is thus discovered to be the cry of a suppressed and reduced humanity, a reduced and suppressed heart. In our reasoning, Benedict XVI made clear that all of that to which we listened must be understood in reference to rejecting God as “Creator.” And the “firstborn of all creation” is not Adam, but Christ. “In the beginning was the Word,” and the Word is himself the “image of the invisible God.” It is in his image that we are created. In his Incarnation, Christ reveals the profound truths about human identity, freedom, and belonging: “God became man so that man might become God.” As we now seek to make a proposal, recall those initial words from Pope Francis: “How important it is to feel challenged by the questions of the men and women of today!” He continues this thought by saying, “Transmitting God[,] to proclaim the Lord is to witness to the joy of knowing Him, it is to help live the beauty of encountering Him.”36 In other words, Pope Francis is telling us that our proposal for people who identify as transgender (and indeed all people) ought to be twofold. First, to be an authentic Christian witness (authority): by your very being and the way you live, be a witness (authority) to what it means to participate in the life of Jesus Christ. Second, to accompany: help others to live the beauty of encountering Christ and do not abandon them in their need for help in living this encounter. Let me say clearly: the answer is not the imposition of values, rules, and 36 Pope Francis, Address to Participants in the International Meeting for Academic Centers and Schools of the New Evangelization. 48 Michael Brungardt policies; it is not a “program” for middle-school students; and it is not a lecture (though these all have their proper place). The answer to the person who identifies as transgender is living the life of a Christian witness who accompanies others. Like the burning bush, we have to be an attractive and radiant presence, people who by our very being show that Jesus Christ and the Christian proposal responds to the cry of our heart—a cry that we all share. Identity As a recently ordained priest, I remember vividly the experience I had of struggling to assume the “identity” of “priest.” Growing up, I was determined to take on the identity of “doctor, husband, and dad.” I “identified” as a future doctor, husband, and dad, and was (self-) determined to take on this identity. Even when I eventually entered seminary, I continued to struggle (as many do) to accept this identity, an identity which seemed to have been forced on me from the outside and was alien to my experience. During one summer, though, everything changed, and it changed not by a lecture or rules or a perfect argument that was made to me. Everything changed through a friendship offered by a Christian witness. Through the witness he provided, and through the constant presence and accompaniment he offered, I was awakened to the fact that this “identity” to which I was called corresponded to the deepest needs of my heart, and was indeed the identity given to me “in the beginning.” I discovered that my identity did not come from self-determination or through “white knuckling” it. It was “given.” We give persons who identify as transgender the proposal needed with regard to identity by living the Christian life, our identity as “little Christs,” in an authentic and attractive way. When we are magnetized to Christ, when we adhere to Christ, when we allow Christ to come close, and are radiant like the burning bush, then we become a living witness, a living question: “Who is this person? Why do they live a life of such authenticity? And what do they have that I do not?” We are tempted to impose an identity on them and make them fit into a category to appease our conscience, but forget that the Christian proposal begins with Jesus Christ and the life and identity he offers. Freedom As I previously mentioned, when I was growing up I learned to play the cello. While learning to play the cello, I had to submit myself to an authority, to my teacher. However, Quinn was not some tyrant, thrilled with the ability to control and dominate; I was not enslaved and suppressed Toward a Proposal for Responding to the Transgender Movement 49 by her authority. Rather, as an authority (or what the Christian tradition calls a “witness” or “evangelist”), Quinn did not suppress my freedom, but ignited it! Although I was constantly frustrated at my inability to exercise my freedom and at times I felt shackled, Quinn was a sustained presence of authority, a witness, that accompanied me. I saw in her playing what I wanted to see in my own playing. The “need of my heart” to be free to play was responded to through her witness, authority, and presence. I became more free in playing the cello by adhering to her teaching. We give persons who identify as transgender the proposal needed in terms of freedom by demonstrating the freedom Jesus Christ has first given to us. If our way of being and living as people conquered and “enslaved” by Christ is perceived as nothing more than oppressed people living under the heteronomous rule of God, who will listen? True adherence to Christ is marked by a freedom that attracts. Can people see the freedom Christ has brought you? Has Christ brought you freedom? Or do they only see an oppressed person “shackled” and embittered by a so-called faith? We can feel justified by imposing rules on others that we feel have also been imposed on us, but forget that these rules are meant to hone and ignite our freedom. Belonging There is a woman at one of the parishes I served at who stopped practicing her faith the day after the funeral of the pastor (who died suddenly and unexpectedly). As I began to speak with her about this, the reason became clear: he was the only one that made her feel welcome. She was from a situation for which the adjectives “irregular” and “complicated” do not do justice. What this priest was able to witness powerfully for this woman was the belonging given by Christ which she possessed. People who identify as transgender feel alienated from the Church for the same reason: they do not feel like they belong. Instead, they only feel like they belong in the LGBTQ community, with people who can give them a community, affirmation, and a different narrative besides the one they find in the Church—the Church which has written them off as dirty, sinful, and unworthy.37 As Christians, but especially as Catholics, we should take time for deep thought and self-reflection on this: by the fact that we are Catholics, we have a priori been labeled as a community that does not accept, love, or accompany people attracted to the same gender, who want to be the other gender, or do not conform to “gender.” We give persons who identify as transgender the proposal needed in 37 Private conversation with Fr. Ryan Adorjan, Diocese of Joliet. 50 Michael Brungardt terms of belonging by seeking them out, by welcoming them, by not keeping them in a “closet.” Once again, the accusation leveled against Jesus was, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them” (Luke 15:2). If, like Christ, we cannot welcome people and eat with them, how can we call ourselves Christians? Jesus ate with sinners—their conversion came later. Responding to the Cry of the Heart I conclude as I began. The problem is not “man” versus “woman.” The problem is us, our humanity: the cry of a suppressed and reduced humanity, a reduced and suppressed heart, the cry of every human heart. At its core, the cry of the person who identifies as transgender is no different from the cry of your heart, of my heart. Our tendency is to get into a battle over Christian culture, a defense of Christian values—and that is important and has its place. Yet, “in the Catholic world, the battle for the defense of values has become, over time, so important that it has ended up being more important than the communication of the newness of Christ and the witness of his humanity.”38 When the creation of policies written under the guise of “upholding Catholic identity” and the retreat to certain truths as a “defense of Christian values” are prioritized over witness to the newness that Christ offers through an encounter with him and the accompaniment needed to live the beauty of this encounter, we are neither upholding Catholic identity nor defending Christian values, but entrenching ourselves in yet another self-defeating ideology which we have fortified against the other competing ideologies of our age. This age in which we live “offers us the opportunity to witness to everyone concerning what happens in existence when man intercepts the Christian event along the road of life. Our experience, in the encounter with Christianity, has shown us that the lifeblood of the values of the person is not Christian laws or juridical structures and confessional politics, but the event of Christ.”39 Just like the first Christians, this age offers us the opportunity to bear witness to everyone what a humanity that lives in relationship to Christ looks like. It is the burning bush: when we encounter Christ, when we live in relationship with him, our humanity is enflamed, made radiant, and more fully alive. Our response starts here. N&V 38 39 Carrón, Disarming Beauty, 18. Carrón, Disarming Beauty, 16. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 51–59 51 Year of Saint Joseph, Spiritual Father: Some Meditations Basil Cole, O.P. Dominican House of Studies Washington, DC There are many objections raised against emphasizing the reality and importance of Saint Joseph. Let me introduce you to some of them to begin our reflection on the greatness of Joseph: 1. The apostles and even Saint John the Baptist communicate more to us in the New Testament. Joseph says nothing, suggesting he is more or less to be kept in the shadows of our redemption. 2. Jesus’s public life, establishing the sacraments, ministers of the sacraments, and the whole Paschal mystery are at the heart of our faith. But Joseph is dead when all his happens, and so has little importance to us. He is never directly mentioned in any creed or solemn definitions of faith. 3. Joseph’s role is exceedingly minor or almost nothing in contrast to Mary’s importance by the general councils and Fathers of the Church for many centuries. 4. To think of giving Joseph a status of proto-dulia—one who deserves the highest honor of all the saints after the Virgin Mary—makes no sense. He lived a very minor role and not even a heroic role in the establishing of the Catholic faith. So, it seems inappropriate that he be given the highest honor, above all the other saints and angels. 5. Saint Joseph was simply an old man with children from a previous family, which explains why there is mentioned brothers and sisters of Jesus. 52 Basil Cole, O.P. To answer these objections takes more time than we have for this conference, but I can share some ideas to allay the many quandaries that some Catholics have when thinking that the life of Joseph is not very important for our salvation. To the first objection, while it is true that we have no words spoken by Joseph in the Sacred Scripture, we do find his inner actions with angels and his obedience. Mary and Joseph’s marriage was probably matched by both of their parents. It is also the teaching of saints and theologians that Mary convinced him to make a vow of perpetual virginity (although we are privy to no conversations that led up to either the marriage or such a vow). To the second objection, even though Joseph was absent from the public ministry and Paschal mystery of Christ, he played an exceedingly important role preparing him for our redemption. The Incarnation was for the redemption of the human race. They are not isolated realities. The Hypostatic Union is the summit of all divine benefits.1 Therefore, no order is superior to it, the order whereby the highest degree of essential goodness can communicate itself to a creature. Saint Thomas says it best: “Christ is the fruit of this marriage; neither a child born in adultery nor an adopted son reared in a marriage is its good, since marriage is not directed to rear such; but the marriage of Joseph was specially ordained for this purpose that the child should be received and brought up within it.” So it has no equal in the natural order. It establishes a fatherhood far above any we know, and hence Joseph has a dominion and ministry over the God-man. He is a father supernaturally.2 Concerning the third objection, while it is true that Joseph is rarely mentioned by general councils and Fathers of the Church, the early centuries of the Church had to face grave threats of heresy (Trinitarian, Christological, soteriological, sacramental, and Mariological, among many others disputes) as well as the martyrdom of its members. All of these kept the understanding of Joseph in the shadows of a robust speculative theology except that he keeps Mary virginal. Fourth, it took a long time of reflection and devotion to realize how important Joseph was to the makeup of the Incarnation. His greatness surpasses all the saints due to his unique role as the spiritual father of Jesus, and the spouse of Mary requiring special graces greater than the apostles or martyrs. One is not given authority over God on earth and the Queen of Heaven and Earth without being given the requisite graces. 1 2 Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles [SCG]IV, ch. 27; see also Aquinas, Summa theologiae [ST] III, qq. 1–7. Aquinas, In IV sent, d. 30, q. 2, 1.3, ad 4. Year of Saint Jorseph, Spritual Father: Some Meditations 53 Jurisdiction and the sacred ministry over the sacraments is remote and pales when contrasted to a ministry over God incarnate and the Blessed Virgin. And Mary also increased in her fullness of grace due to the good deeds he did for her and she for him. Moreover, the dignity of Mary’s motherhood is greater than grace itself, as she is adorned in her womb with divinity.3 So, Saint John Damascene writes about Joseph that he is “the spouse of Mary: nothing greater could be said of him.” Leo XIII said Joseph arrived closer to that dignity of Mary than any other creature because there is a kind of communication of goods between husband and wife due to the union and surrender of each to each. If Mary’s dignity is called quasi-infinite, it is not in the same order as habitual grace, but above all grace, even as the divine person himself is greater than grace itself. 4 The final objection is answered accordingly. Today most who reflect on Saint Joseph know from Scripture studies that the phrase “brothers and sisters” is not to be taken literally in all instances, but could be used for friends and relatives. Further, to think of Joseph as an old man would make the journey to Egypt whereby he became the savior of the Savior more unlikely, given human nature’s physical weakness to walk the 240 miles to Cairo. Then on arrival, it takes a certain creative spunk to find a home and a job and make new friends with a new environment in a foreign country. Turning now to Pope Francis’s apostolic letter Patris Corde (With a Father’s Heart) concerning Saint Joseph, he begins in section one with the following introduction: The greatness of Saint Joseph is that he was the spouse of Mary and the father of Jesus. In this way, he placed himself, in the words of Saint John Chrysostom, “at the service of the entire plan of salvation.”5 Those two major responsibilities of Joseph describe his identity and call forth an understanding of his personal grace of vocation. This letter of the present Pontiff is in tandem with the opening of a year in honor of Saint Joseph and in many ways continues the papal magisterium of previous popes, especially the last major document by Saint John Paul on Saint Joseph, Redemptoris Custos (Guardian of the Redeemer). Francis even 3 4 5 In I sent., d. 45, q. 1, a. 3. ST III, q. 7, a. 13, ad 3. Pope Francis, Patris Corde [PC] (2020), §1 (“A Beloved Father”). 54 Basil Cole, O.P. continues with a citation from that document, which in turn cites Saint Paul VI’s teaching as well: Saint Paul VI pointed out that Joseph concretely expressed his fatherhood “by making his life a sacrificial service to the mystery of the incarnation and its redemptive purpose. He employed his legal authority over the Holy Family to devote himself completely to them in his life and work. He turned his human vocation to domestic love into a superhuman oblation of himself, his heart and all his abilities, a love placed at the service of the Messiah who was growing to maturity in his home.”6 When Saint John Paul wrote his apostolic exhortation, many previous papal teachings had been written to encourage devotion to Saint Joseph, but Redemptoris Custos gives its readers many theological underpinnings for the spiritual life to encourage prayer to Saint Joseph. The Christian faithful are reminded that when Joseph is given authority as a husband over the future Queen of Heaven and Earth, his spousal love is produced by special gifts of the Holy Spirit so that, while remaining virginal, he would have real chaste affection for his spouse whom he willingly chose to keep as his best friend, and preserve their virginity intact with a special gift from God. In addition, Saint Thomas Aquinas reminds his readers that, when God chooses someone for a special mission in the Church, he always prepares that person with many graces, and sometimes gifts of nature to fulfill that task.7 The reader is recalled to this spiritual insight by Saint John Paul: Joseph did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took his wife” in to his home (Matt 1:24); what was conceived in Mary was “of the Holy Spirit.” From expressions such as these are we not to suppose that his love as a man was also given new birth by the Holy Spirit? Are we not to think that the love of God which has been poured forth into the human heart through the Holy Spirit (see Rom 5:5) molds every human love to perfection? This love of God also molds—in a completely unique way—the love of husband and wife, deepening within it everything of human worth and beauty, everything that bespeaks an exclusive gift of self, a covenant between persons, and an authentic communion according to the model of the Blessed Trinity. 6 7 PC, §1, citing the passage from Paul VI quoted in St. John Paul II, Redemptoris Custos [RC] (1989), §8. ST III, q. 98, a. 5, ad 3. Year of Saint Jorseph, Spritual Father: Some Meditations 55 “Joseph . . . took his wife; but he knew her not, until she had borne a son” (Matt 1:24–25). These words indicate another kind of closeness in marriage. The deep spiritual closeness arising from marital union and the interpersonal contact between man and woman have their definitive origin in the Spirit, the Giver of Life (see John 6:63). Joseph, in obedience to the Spirit, found in the Spirit the source of love, the conjugal love which he experienced as a man. And this love proved to be greater than this “just man” could ever have expected within the limits of his human heart.8 Likewise, when it comes to Joseph’s fatherly and affectionate love of Jesus as a child in his household, Saint John Paul also points out: Since it is inconceivable that such a sublime task would not be matched by the necessary qualities to adequately fulfill it, we must recognize that Joseph showed Jesus “by a special gift from heaven, all the natural love, all the affectionate solicitude that a father's heart can know.” Besides fatherly authority over Jesus, God also gave Joseph a share in the corresponding love, the love that has its origin in the Father "from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named" (Eph 3:15).9 In the case of his virginal marriage, Joseph accepted this gift and challenge so that he could concentrate more exclusively on God and his purposes, while at the same time be a husband who knew how to both affirm his wife’s role and goodness in the home and educate his son on the human level. As Saint Thomas reminds us, marriage is the highest friendship because it includes the gift of one’s total self to will, in a practical way, benefits to one’s spouse in terms of conversations, happy surprises, family decisions, and sacrifices.10And even though they did not engage in authentic and holy conjugal acts, this did not prevent them from sacrificing for and enjoying each other’s presence, even while discussing the daily family “ups and downs” of life. This would have included how to change family rules as the baby Jesus became a child, a teenager, and an adult. Moreover, since Joseph worked as a carpenter, he must have had many stories with which to regale his little family about some of the odd customers who came to his workshop. Further, his holiness would not have deprived him or 8 9 10 RC, §19. RC, §8. SCG III, ch. 123, a. 6. 56 Basil Cole, O.P. the family of his sense of humor. As Saint Thomas reminds his followers: “Grace does not destroy nature, rather it purifies and elevates it.”11 While it may seem odd to believe that Thomists would praise Francisco Suarez, S.J., yet the latter seems to have been the first theologian to teach that the Incarnation of the Word of God implies a deep order.12 What does this mean? God chose to become man in a marriage, not to a single mother, and therefore in a daily family setting for parents to educate and take care of him. The Word of God did not become “flesh” in a vacuum, but very concretely with many purposes, some beyond a theologian’s ability to understand. It took the consent of a betrothed woman to say “yes” to the will of God through an appearance of the angel Gabriel, and the consent of her husband to say “yes” to another angel for the Holy Family to continue the marriage after Joseph’s discovery of Mary’s pregnancy and his thoughts that he should withdraw from this mysterious relationship. The Word of God could have accomplished the redemption of the human race in a million other ways, but he chose this order or plan of entering the world with the consent of a woman and her husband. Saint Thomas does not like to answer “what if” questions. We human beings do not know, if either of them would have said “no” to the angel’s requests, what would have been the consequences for us. Notwithstanding, since both Mary and Joseph accepted their vocations, Suarez goes on to teach that Mary’s role was intrinsically necessary for the Incarnation. Given today’s understanding of biology, God wanted to become incarnate beginning in a woman’s womb using in part her genetic makeup and the Holy Spirit creating the other portion, thereby creating a male fetus. God wanted to enter the world from the womb of a mother. While Joseph gave nothing of his physical being to the makeup of Jesus, yet he too was essential in other ways for the Incarnation, given God’s will to enter the world through a marriage yet without a holy conjugal act. Suarez observes that Joseph’s role was extrinsically necessary for the Incarnation, given the decision of God himself. Many theologians would say that this order or plan of the Incarnation is a reality greater than sanctifying grace, because the latter gift elevates someone as an adopted son or daughter of God together with other divine gifts and dignities. But to be integral and necessary for the Incarnation to exist, given God’s decision, and to possess authority over God incarnate—all of this suggests and even demands that grace be given in super11 12 ST I, q. 1, a. 8, ad 2. Francisco Suárez, Summam S. Thomae III, q. 29, disp. 8, sect. I. Year of Saint Jorseph, Spritual Father: Some Meditations 57 abundance to Mary first and to Joseph second, both because of the infinite dignity of being the Mother of God, and in the case of Joseph, being the spouse of the Virgin Mary, thereby sharing in her dignity, as well as being the chosen and commanded father of God on earth. His fatherhood demanded that he raise the Lord Jesus in his masculine spirituality, and so prepare him for his public ministry and his death on the Cross for our salvation. Joseph is rightly called by Saint John Paul a special minister of the economy of salvation.13 Patris Corde develops many practical themes for the spiritual life of ordinary people, as well as religious and clerics, especially men, since Joseph led a hidden life of work, under the power of the grace of the Holy Spirit. As Pope Francis says in his introduction: Each of us can discover in Joseph—the man who goes unnoticed, a daily, discreet and hidden presence—an intercessor, a support and a guide in times of trouble. Saint Joseph reminds us that those who appear hidden or in the shadows can play an incomparable role in the history of salvation. A word of recognition and of gratitude is due to them all.14 Since the principal perspective of Saint Joseph is his fatherhood, the document is a challenge or call for men to appropriate several key concepts for the spiritual life of present and future fathers. The Holy Father asserts throughout his work a theology of weakness, together with merciful love, and creative courage in dealing with seemingly impossible situations in life. For example, fathers in general, when correcting their sons and daughters, can become overly harsh rather than patient while being definitive. Worse still, fathers can ignore their sons’ shortcoming and never lovingly correct them either. This overreaction or under-reaction may be due in part to either the self-hatred in themselves or a failure of courage, which is often projected onto their children and often to their wives. So, Francis reminds fathers of the following in section 2: The history of salvation is worked out “in hope against hope” (Rom 4:18), through our weaknesses. All too often, we think that God works only through our better parts, yet most of his plans are realized in and despite our frailty. Thus Saint Paul could say: “To keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too 13 14 13 RC, §32. PC, introduction. 58 Basil Cole, O.P. elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness’” (2 Cor 12:7–9). Since this is part of the entire economy of salvation, we must learn to look upon our weaknesses with tender mercy.15 The Evil one makes us see and condemn our frailty, whereas the Spirit brings it to light with tender love. Tenderness is the best way to touch the frailty within us. Pointing fingers and judging others are frequently signs of an inability to accept our own weaknesses, our own frailty. Only tender love will save us from the snares of the accuser (see Rev 12:10). That is why it is so important to encounter God’s mercy, especially in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, where we experience his truth and tenderness. Paradoxically, the Evil one can also speak the truth to us, yet he does so only to condemn us. We know that God’s truth does not condemn, but instead welcomes, embraces, sustains and forgives us. That truth always presents itself to us like the merciful father in Jesus’ parable (see Luke 15:11–32). It comes out to meet us, restores our dignity, sets us back on our feet and rejoices for us, for, as the father says: “This my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found” (v. 24).16 Another aspect of fatherhood, whether in married or even priestly life, consists in learning to accept responsibility for others notwithstanding their weaknesses. As Francis admonishes present and future fathers: Joseph’s attitude encourages us to accept and welcome others as they are, without exception, and to show special concern for the weak, for God chooses what is weak (see 1 Cor 1:27).17 However, to get to that point in the spiritual life, one has to first learn how to handle with creative courage the reality of failures and weaknesses of others as they exist in front of us. Francis emphasizes: God always finds a way to save us, provided we show the same creative courage as the carpenter of Nazareth, who was able to turn a problem into a possibility by trusting always in divine providence. If at times God seems not to help us, surely this does not mean 15 16 17 PC, §2. PC, 2. PC, 4. Year of Saint Jorseph, Spritual Father: Some Meditations 59 that we have been abandoned, but instead are being trusted to plan, to be creative, and to find solutions ourselves.18 When being a father sometimes seems overly burdensome and there appears to be no solution in sight to conflicts, whether in home life or the life of work, the same abandonment to God’s plans which Joseph possessed throughout his life can come to our aid. Pope Francis explains, Just as God told Joseph: “Son of David, do not be afraid!” (Matt 1:20), so he seems to tell us: “Do not be afraid!” We need to set aside all anger and disappointment, and to embrace the way things are, even when they do not turn out as we wish. Not with mere resignation but with hope and courage. In this way, we become open to a deeper meaning. Our lives can be miraculously reborn if we find the courage to live them in accordance with the Gospel. It does not matter if everything seems to have gone wrong or some things can no longer be fixed. God can make flowers spring up from stony ground. Even if our heart condemns us, “God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything” (1 John 3:20).19 These spiritual insights of Pope Francis should inspire fathers with hope when faced with seeming impossible problems, and going to Joseph in prayer can keep us steady on the way to heaven, because “only the Lord can give us the strength needed to accept life as it is, with all its contradictions, frustrations and disappointments.”20 In conclusion, the child supernaturally generated in Mary belonged by right of marriage to Joseph. So Joseph came closer to Christ than all other men. By his labors and solicitude, he maintained and protected the God-man. Grace was therefore superabundant in his ministry as a result. He cooperated in the constitution of the hypostatic order in a true and singular manner, serving the Hypostatic Union in a direct, immediate, and necessary way by God’s design. By a special divine ordination, Christ then is the fruit and effect of the marriage between the Blessed Virgin and Joseph. Jesus was received within their marriage. So, there is a true bond of dependence between the ministry of Joseph and the Incarnation that should lead the Christian to have a love for and devotion to Joseph. N&V 18 20 21 PC, 5. PC, 4. RC, §4. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 61–76 61 Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. Saint Vincent Seminary Latrobe, PA One of the greatest graces of the year of Saint Joseph1 is the way it shifts our gaze to marriage and family. Catholic devotion and theology have focused extensively on the relationship of Jesus and Mary, and rightly so! Out of reverence for the great wonder of the virginity of Mary, we have traditionally overlooked her marriage to Saint Joseph. When we zoom out to include Saint Joseph, however, we now have in view a marriage and a family. This is especially important in the midst of our current social confusion and crisis over marriage. By focusing the Church’s attention on Saint Joseph, it seems that the Holy Spirit is directing us to look more carefully at this holy marriage and this Holy Family. Sometimes we get the impression from Catholic theology or popular devotion, because of the focus on Mary and Jesus, that Joseph was more like an appendix to this holy Mother and Son. It almost seems as if the angel Gabriel would have come to Mary anyway and Joseph just happened to get involved first. His involvement can even appear to create certain problems that require some divine intervention to fix up with an angelic appearance in an inspired dream. Joseph seems to complicate things in a way that appears not to be part of the original plan, and their marriage appears to be an inconvenience that interferes with the real theodrama of the Incarnation. The really important part of the narrative seems to focus on Mary’s virginity and her sublime fiat to God’s initiative. Her real spouse is the Holy Spirit 1 Pope Francis, Patris Corde [PC], Apostolic Letter on the 150th Anniversary of the Proclamation of Saint Joseph as Patron of the Universal Church (December 8, 2020). All magisterial documents sited are available on the Vatican website. 62 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. and Joseph comes across as a kind of butler in the service of this noble household. Or worse: “In other ancient fictions, he appears as something of a buffoon. Again, the authors seem to think that Mary would be exalted if her husband were humiliated.”2 In contrast to this view, Scripture actually places the marriage in the primary position by mentioning it first. It draws attention to the fact that their marriage was already a reality before the Incarnation. Both evangelists Matthew and Luke indicate this clearly in their introduction of the Blessed Virgin.3 She was already a married woman when the angel came to her. This fact has also entered into the liturgical prayer of the Church. The commemoration of the Espousal has even been celebrated liturgically at different times in the Church in more recent centuries (on August 29 initially, or more commonly on January 23).4 Though we do not know the details of that betrothal outside of the mosaic fragments offered through the kaleidoscope of visionaries, we know that there was a betrothal and that it was something typically Jewish in accordance with the Mosaic law. We do not want to diminish in the least detail the profound mystery which is made possible through Mary’s “yes” and that unfolds uniquely in history. The prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled exactly once when the Virgin conceives and bears a Son. Without taking anything away from this, a very different, and indeed a more beautiful picture unfolds. In the longest papal teaching on Saint Joseph, Pope Saint John Paul II was emphatic: “And while it is important for the Church to profess the virginal conception of Jesus, it is no less important to uphold Mary’s marriage to Joseph.”5 Pope John Paul II refocuses our attention on their marriage as an intentional pre-cursor to the Incarnation. In fact, God willed to bring about our redemption not only through a virgin but indeed also through a marriage. Pope John Paul II emphasized this fact in quoting from Pope Saint Paul 2 3 4 5 Mike Aquilina, “Getting to Know Joseph: The Church’s Appreciation for the Head of the Holy Family Has Developed over Millennia,” Knights of Columbus, March 1, 2021, kofc.org/en/news-room/columbia/2021/march/ getting-to-know-joseph.html. “When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together” (Matt 1:18); “In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary” (Luke 1:26–27). See Leonora Butau, “The Espousal of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St Joseph—a Feast for our Times,” ICN: Independent Catholic News, indcatholicnews.com/ news/38776. Pope Saint John Paul II, Redemptoris Custos [RC] (1989), §7. Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family 63 VI: “The Savior began the work of salvation by this virginal and holy union, wherein is manifested his all-powerful will to purify and sanctify the family—that sanctuary of love and cradle of life.”6 Pope Leo XIII emphasized the same point in his letter Neminem Fugit: When God in his mercy determined to accomplish the work of man’s renewal, which same had so many long ages awaited, he appointed and ordained this work on such wise that its very beginning might shew to the world the august spectacle of a Family which was known to be divinely constituted; that therein all men might behold a perfect model, as well of domestic life as of every virtue and pattern of holiness: for such indeed was the Holy Family of Nazareth.7 Finally, Pope Francis presented this idea in a dramatic way at the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia in 2015 when he departed from his prepared text and said: “When the man and his wife [Adam and Eve] went astray and walked away from God, God did not leave them alone. Such was his love. So great was his love that he began to walk with mankind, he began to walk alongside his people, until the right time came and then he gave the greatest demonstration of love: his Son. And where did he send his Son? To a palace, to a city, to an office building? He sent him to a family. God came into the world in a family.”8 This consistent papal magisterium highlights the intentionality rather than the coincidence of the marriage between Mary and Joseph. It is not the accidental landing place for the Incarnate Word. In fact, Catholic theology upholds something even more daring. Starting with Saint Augustine, we see that the Incarnate Word is actually the offspring of this genuine marriage: “In Christ’s parents all the goods of marriage were realized—offspring, fidelity, the sacrament: the offspring being the Lord Jesus himself; fidelity, since there was no adultery; the sacrament, since there was no divorce.”9 The understandable concern of earlier times was to prevent the misconception that Jesus was the physical offspring of the 6 7 8 9 RC, §7, quoting Pope Saint Paul VI, Discourse to the “Equipes Notre-Dame” Movement, May 4, 1970, §7. Pope Leo XIII, Breve Neminem Fugit (1892; instituting the feast of the Holy Family), the-american-catholic.com/2015/12/27/breve-neminem-fugit/. Pope Francis, Address at the Prayer Vigil for the World Meeting of Families, Sept 26, 2015. Augustine, De nuptiis et concupiscentia 1.11.13 (Patrologia Latina, 44:421), quoted in RC, §7. 64 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. marriage. However, this tended to cloud over the important role that the marriage played in the drama of salvation. Saint Thomas Aquinas repeated this teaching of Saint Augustine,10 and it gives the foundation for the later papal statements we considered about the importance of the marriage. Although Jesus is not the offspring of a physical union between Joseph and Mary, he is indeed the offspring of their marriage. For this reason, Saint Augustine also emphasized that in Scripture Joseph is rightly called “father,” and Joseph and Mary together are called the “parents” of Jesus.11 When we focus our attention on God’s design that made the marriage of Mary and Joseph a necessary part of his plan of salvation, we can discover several beautiful truths. First we reenvision Saint Joseph. Rather than being an inconvenient buffoon, his unique and preeminent holiness emerge clearly as a predestined minister in the order of the Hypostatic Union.12 Indeed, he was specifically formed and chosen as the husband of the Blessed Virgin, the human father of Jesus, and the head of the Holy Family. Second we recognize how God mediates his plan of salvation through our humanity, entrusting the human formation of his divine Son to a man and a woman united in marriage. Third we come to appreciate that at the foundation of the redemption is not just an individual, nor even a couple, but actually a triple. God inaugurates a new creation with a communion of love, with a family. From this we can draw some lessons for 10 11 12 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae [ST] III, q. 29, a. 2, sc. Augustine, De nuptiis et concupiscentia 1.12: “And because of this conjugal fidelity they are both deservedly called ‘parents’ of Christ (not only she as His mother, but he as His father, as being her husband), both having been such in mind and purpose, though not in the flesh. But while the one was His father in purpose only, and the other His mother in the flesh also, they were both of them, for all that, only the parents of His humility, not of His sublimity; of His weakness, not of His divinity. For the Gospel does not lie, in which one reads, ‘Both His father and His mother marveled at those things which were spoken about Him;’ and in another passage, ‘Now His parents went to Jerusalem every year;’ and again a little afterwards, ‘His mother said to Him, “Son, why have You thus dealt with us? Behold, Your father and I have sought You sorrowing”’” (trans. at newadvent. org/fathers/15071.htm). Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., explicates this at greater length in the final chapter of his mariological work: “Certain offices pertain to the order of sanctifying grace, and among them that of the Apostles holds the highest place; thus they have need of more gratuitous gifts than other souls, especially gratuitous gifts of wisdom. But there are other offices which touch upon or border on the order of the Hypostatic Union, . . . as can be seen clearly in the case of the divine maternity of the Blessed Virgin, and it is to that order that the ministry of St. Joseph pertains” (Mother of the Saviour: And Our Interior Life, trans. Bernard J. Kelly [Charlotte, NC: TAN, 1948]). Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family 65 the family today and we can look to the Holy Family to help us overcome the current crisis in marriage and family. Joseph’s Dignity When we consider that Joseph was chosen specifically to be the husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary then we can also acknowledge the grace God would give him to carry out that vocation. We can apply what Saint Thomas taught about the Blessed Virgin also to her husband Joseph: “Those whom God chooses for an office, He prepares and disposes in such a way that they become suited to it, according to the saying of St. Paul, ‘He has made us fit ministers of the New Covenant’ (2 Cor 3:6). But the Blessed Virgin was divinely chosen to be the Mother of God, and therefore there can be no doubt that God fitted her for this position by means of His grace.”13 This invites our reflection on the dignity of Saint Joseph as one who was made worthy to be a spouse of Mary. He needed a strength to protect her body but also a sensitivity to protect her heart. He needed the grace to perfect his chastity in a way that it could blossom in friendship (see the Catechism of the Catholic Church [CCC], §2347). He needed the modesty that could keep hidden the precious treasures that were entrusted to his care (see CCC, §§2521–22).14 In the magisterial logic of Pope Leo XIII: “But as Joseph has been united to the Blessed Virgin by the ties of marriage, it may not be doubted that he approached nearer than any to the eminent dignity by which the Mother of God surpasses so nobly all created natures.”15 Pope Leo XIII is unhesitating in presenting us with a marriage that soared above all others in its beauty, intimacy and perfection. He describes the marriage of two saints, indeed the greatest two saints, and sees how the marriage was itself even more sanctifying for them. Pope Leo XIII elaborates three reasons for the surpassing dignity of Saint Joseph: first because he is chosen and equipped as husband of the Blessed Virgin, then because of his unique vocation to foster the Incarnate Word: “And Joseph shines among all mankind by the most august dignity, since by divine will, he was the guardian of the Son of God and reputed as His father among men.”16 Pope Leo XIII further argued: “Hence it came about that the Word of God was humbly subject to Joseph, that He obeyed him, and that He rendered to 13 14 15 16 ST III, q. 27, a. 4, corp. Boniface Hicks, O.S.B., Through the Heart of St. Joseph (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Road, 2021), 35–36. Pope Leo XIII, Quamquam Pluries [QP] (1889), §3. QP, §3. 66 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. him all those offices that children are bound to render to their parents.”17 Finally, Joseph was charged with responsibility as head of the Holy Family, completing the threefold reason for his eminent dignity.18 Though we have often quickly overlooked this holy marriage, with these powerful proclamations Pope Leo XIII is inviting us to fix our gaze on it. The marriage of Mary and Joseph was not superficial or merely functional. Contrary to the images of Saint Joseph being merely a guardian to Mary and Jesus, he is presented as much more. He is an equal in the marriage, and both receives from it and contributes to it: “For marriage is the most intimate of all unions which from its essence imparts a community of gifts between those that by it are joined together.”19 Pope Leo XIII speaks of a community of gifts that are received by and shared between the holy couple. What would these gifts be? Of course the greatest is Jesus, the fruit of their marriage, who is God himself. In him they receive everything. At the same time, there are many other gifts that they share, including the gift of their hearts communicated in times of silence, in times of sharing, in times of working together, in times of shared anxiety, and in times of shared joy. We are invited to see Joseph in all his dignity as the true spouse of Mary. Pope Leo XIII described Saint Joseph as Mary’s “life’s companion” and a “participator in her sublime dignity.”20 Not unlike the spouse who enjoys the benefits of a spouse’s fame or fortune, Saint Joseph is the happy beneficiary of Mary’s heavenly fame and divine vocation. He is not merely overshadowed by her radiance, but enlightened and illuminated by it. He shares in her holiness, in her virtues, in her merits. He has the privilege of enjoying the world through her Immaculate Heart and he has the grace of beholding the light of the nations through her eyes and in her arms.21 Far from being a functionary kept off to the side, or merely a pack animal to carry their baggage on long journeys, Saint Joseph is an intimate and integral participant in the hidden years of Christ’s life. It is staggering to imagine that he had the privilege of introducing the Son of God to the Jerusalem temple, walking with his toddler into that tabernacle that could not contain his presence. Presumably he taught him to read Hebrew and 17 18 19 20 21 QP, §3. QP, §3. QP, §3. QP, §3. Drawing on Pope John Paul II’s description of the Rosary as the contemplation of the face of Jesus through the eyes of Mary (see Rosarium Virginis Mariae [2002], §§9–16), we can think of Saint Joseph as the first advocate of this holy devotional way of prayer. Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family 67 then taught the Incarnate Word to pray the Psalms with his little human voice. We can imagine that he had the joy of presiding over the first wooden creation, as he guided the little hands of the very Creator of wood. The mystery hidden from ages past had become the mystery hidden in Mary’s womb, placed under Joseph’s care, and kept safe in Joseph’s house. After many centuries of an important and beautiful focus on Mary and Jesus, the Church in the last centuries is taking one step back to see that the image of the infant Jesus in Mary’s arms always takes place in the context of Joseph’s loving presence. Jesus is entrusted into the care of a marriage. Like every marriage, the marriage of Joseph and Mary finds its perfection in its offspring, and in the case of this marriage, it has a divine perfection in its divine offspring. The Incarnate Word is the infinite mystery at the center of their family. That mystery dwells first in the womb of Mary and then remains in the heart of Mary. The woman’s heart that bears the mystery remains the center of the family. But as we make one more step outward, we find another concentric circle and see how that heart is situated in the protective care of a husband who always adores this mystery together with his holy bride. Joseph as Husband and Father Saint Thomas posits several reasons why it was fitting that the Virgin should be espoused before she conceived.22 Two of those reasons focus on the roles of Saint Joseph as husband and father. He says that Mary and Jesus are the beneficiaries of Saint Joseph’s spousal love and fatherly love, respectively. Here again we see that Saint Joseph is not a mere attachment to the noble pair but an intimate and integral part of these divine mysteries. Saint Thomas argues that it was fitting for Mary to be espoused to Joseph before she conceived because, “as Jerome says, Joseph might administer to her wants.”23 Along with the defensive and practical reasons of protecting her honor and preventing accusations of her being an adulteress, Saint Thomas also acknowledges the valuable role that Joseph plays in her life. The Blessed Virgin’s life is better for having a husband. She herself is not merely a tool in a salvation operation, but a human woman with a tender heart who can receive love from a husband who delights in serving her. We are edified by their spousal love and invited to ponder it that we might also receive the overflow of their affections. We are, after all, baptized into Jesus and so we also benefit from the stability of a home 22 23 ST III, q. 29, a. 1. ST III, q. 29, a. 1, sc. 68 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. that is established and held firm by the union of these two hearts in their marriage. As Pope Saint John Paul II described it: Analyzing the nature of marriage, both St. Augustine and St. Thomas always identify it with an “indivisible union of souls,” a “union of hearts,” with “consent.” These elements are found in an exemplary manner in the marriage of Mary and Joseph. At the culmination of the history of salvation, when God reveals his love for humanity through the gift of the Word, it is precisely the marriage of Mary and Joseph that brings to realization in full “freedom” the “spousal gift of self” in receiving and expressing such a love.24 The exalted level of their union might seem especially surprising in the light of their abstinence from physical sexual intercourse. Saint Thomas Aquinas reflects on this in asking whether the marriage of Mary and Joseph was a true marriage. He explains that the perfection of a thing requires the perfection of its form and the perfection of its end. Then he explains the form and end of matrimony: The form of matrimony consists in a certain inseparable union of souls, by which husband and wife are pledged by a bond of mutual affection that cannot be sundered. And the end of matrimony is the begetting and upbringing of children: the first of which [begetting children] is attained by conjugal intercourse; the second [upbringing of children] by the other duties of husband and wife, by which they help one another in rearing their offspring. Mary and Joseph were able to form an inseparable bond, beget a child, and raise him without use of the means of conjugal intercourse. Saint Thomas focused his teaching on intercourse as a means, rather than an end, in marriage, especially in regard to its necessity for the begetting of children. Later magisterial teaching recognized the role that intercourse plays also in the unification of the married couple.25 In reality, these two 24 25 RC, §7. Pope Saint Paul VI taught: “The Church, nevertheless, in urging men to the observance of the precepts of the natural law, which it interprets by its constant doctrine, teaches that each and every marital act must of necessity retain its intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life. This particular doctrine, often expounded by the magisterium of the Church, is based on the inseparable connection, established by God, which man on his own initiative may not break, between the unitive significance and the procreative significance which are both Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family 69 ends of intercourse are inseparable, because the begetting and raising of children is supported by and fosters the union of the couple. On the other hand, the union of the couple is defective if it is not open to the begetting and raising of children. For Mary and Joseph, this procreation and union were fostered supernaturally without intercourse and sustained by grace through their mutual perfection in love. While Saint Thomas focused on sexual intercourse as a means towards procreation, a genuine development of doctrine sees sexual intercourse not only as a means but also as an expression of self-donation and union. Building on Pope Paul VI’s teaching in Humanae Vitae, Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body focuses on the capacity for self-donation that occurs through sexual intercourse as part of the perfection of marriage and the nuptial meaning of the body. John Crosby explains his teaching: Self-donation belongs to man as person; . . . it belongs to him no less than selfhood and self-possession. The supreme self-donation between human persons is spousal self-donation. . . . John Paul adds: this spousal self-donation can be fully expressed and enacted only when a man and a woman in marriage become one flesh (Genesis 2, 24). . . . This potential of the masculinity and the femininity of the human body to serve the supreme self-donation of persons is what the Holy Father calls the “nuptial meaning of the human body.”26 In the case of Mary and Joseph, there was a miraculous union and fruitfulness that normally come about through the means of marital intercourse. Furthermore, they were able to live out the intimacy of marriage and self-donation without its bodily expression in sexual intercourse. Like the singular miracle of the conception, it seems that there was an ongoing supernatural grace of self-donation without recourse to marital intercourse. This was necessary for them to fulfill their divine vocation to be the parents of Jesus, because the effectiveness of motherhood and fatherhood is dependent on the capacity of self-donation that is normally expressed between spouses and fostered in conjugal union. We can see 26 inherent to the marriage act. The reason is that the fundamental nature of the marriage act, while uniting husband and wife in the closest intimacy, also renders them capable of generating new life—and this as a result of laws written into the actual nature of man and of woman” (Humanae Vitae [1968], §§11–12). John Crosby, “The Personalism of John Paul II as the Basis of His Approach to the Teaching of Humanae Vitae,” in Why Humanae Vitae Was Right: A Reader, ed. Janet Smith (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1993), 222. 70 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. how the same grace that made possible the virginal fruit of their marriage also provided miraculously for their virginal union as spouses and their capacity for self-donation. Furthermore, the uniqueness of the fruit of their marriage made the begetting of any additional children unnecessary. In fact, the miraculous begetting of this one child not only fulfilled their particular calling in marriage, but actually inaugurated a new chapter in the meaning of marriage, raising it to the level of a sacrament: Jesus was born and lived in a concrete family, accepting all its characteristic features and he conferred the highest dignity on the institution of marriage, making it a sacrament of the new covenant (cf. Mt 19:3–9). It is in this new perspective that the couple finds the fullness of its dignity and the family its solid foundation.27 Additionally, Saint Thomas lists Joseph’s care for Jesus as another reason that it was fitting for Mary to be espoused to Joseph before she conceived. After recognizing Joseph’s importance in protecting Jesus’s reputation against being born of adultery, in ensuring that his genealogy might be traced through the male line, and in protecting him from the devil, he then explained: “that He might be fostered by Joseph: who is therefore called His ‘father,’ as bread-winner.”28 Being fostered by Joseph is a positive value for Jesus in his humanity according to Saint Thomas. This invites us to reflect on the designs of God, who did not send his Son into the world as a fully formed adult man. He sent his Son as a fertilized ovum, a zygote, into the womb of Mary, who was in the care of Saint Joseph. Just as Mary’s proper care for her body during her pregnancy was important for the formation of Jesus’s humanity and just as proper nutrition continued to be necessary for him as he grew through the stages of childhood, so also the proper affection from a mother and father was necessary for the ordinary formation of his sacred humanity. Although God can intervene miraculously to achieve certain ends, we do not get any indication that he intervened that way with Jesus. Rather, he gave him the ordinary supports in a mother and a father. Furthermore, he formed the mother and father to be of the highest dignity and holiness and perfection in love and grace so that they would most perfectly form the humanity of the miraculous offspring of their marriage. 27 28 Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2014), §210. ST III, q. 29, a. 1, sc. Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family 71 In doing this, God honored his own design of our humanity, not subverting the normal processes of growth. As much as we grow from proper nutrition, even more we develop internally through the loving affirmation of a father’s care. Saint Thomas acknowledges this natural human need when he says that there is a benefit for Mary’s Son in having her husband to foster him. Pope Francis reflects on the way that Joseph loved Jesus and Mary in his letter inaugurating the year of Saint Joseph: “The logic of love is always the logic of freedom, and Joseph knew how to love with extraordinary freedom. He never made himself the centre of things. He did not think of himself, but focused instead on the lives of Mary and Jesus.”29 Like Saint Augustine, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Pope Leo XIII, and Pope Saint John Paul II, Pope Francis helps us to see the positive value of Joseph’s love. Joseph was not an accidental interloper on the stage of salvation history, but an essential and integral part of this beautiful drama. His love helps us see God’s design even more clearly. When “God sent forth His Son, born of woman,” he sent him into a marriage, forming a family, and entrusted his upbringing to a mother and a father (Gal 4:4). Joseph was an integral and intimate part of this moment that marks the fullness of time, and not merely as a “guardian” or “trustee,” but rather as a father (Gal 4:2). Indeed, the Son, in whom it has become possible for us to say “Abba!” to God, first said “Abba!” to Joseph in his humanity (see Gal 4:4–6). In reflecting on the fatherhood of Joseph, Pope Francis reflects further on the important role that fathers play in the lives of their children: “Every child is the bearer of a unique mystery that can only be brought to light with the help of a father who respects that child’s freedom.”30 In this case, the fatherhood of Joseph follows the pattern described by Pope Francis, and in fact we could say that it fulfills this pattern par excellence. There is no greater and no more unique mystery than the One that grew up in the house of Joseph and under the care of his loving fatherhood. We can even see the way that that mystery was “brought to light” by Joseph in the very bestowal of Jesus’s Name. Although Jesus always knew He had a Father in heaven, and at least in divine and infused knowledge knew his sacred mission, we can envision how he experienced that knowledge in his humanity as he discovered the story of his conception and his name from Saint Joseph’s own narrative. While God can always act in sovereign ways to reveal his power, He ordinarily honors his creative design of our humanity. He shows us that in 29 30 PC, §7. PC, §7. 72 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. a particular way in the Holy Family and he summons our natural participation in his plan of salvation, after the pattern of Saint Joseph. He calls us to offer our own human, tender, loving care for the poor, the widow, and the orphan. Pope Francis offers a teaching about the Josephite fatherhood that comes about not only through childbirth, but through a loving, committed choice: Fathers are not born, but made. A man does not become a father simply by bringing a child into the world, but by taking up the responsibility to care for that child. Whenever a man accepts responsibility for the life of another, in some way he becomes a father to that person. Children today often seem orphans, lacking fathers.31 Returning to the observation of Saint Thomas about the value that Joseph brings to both Mary, by being her husband, and to Jesus, by being a father to him, we can see how God wants us to reverence his own design of marriage and family. God neither violates nor sidesteps marriage and family in carrying out the work of salvation. Rather, he honors it and works through it: As we read the infancy narratives, we may often wonder why God did not act in a more direct and clear way. Yet God acts through events and people. Joseph was the man chosen by God to guide the beginnings of the history of redemption. He was the true “miracle” by which God saves the child and his mother. God acted by trusting in Joseph’s creative courage. Arriving in Bethlehem and finding no lodging where Mary could give birth, Joseph took a stable and, as best he could, turned it into a welcoming home for the Son of God come into the world (cf. Luke 2:6–7).32 A Holy Family for the Sake of All Families As noted earlier, the words of Pope Saint Paul VI guide us in seeing the fundamental role of the family in the plan of salvation as we continue our reflection on the Holy Family of Nazareth: “The Savior began the work of salvation by this virginal and holy union, wherein is manifested his all-powerful will to purify and sanctify the family—that sanctuary of love 31 32 PC, §7. PC, §5. Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family 73 and cradle of life.”33 This is a truth that is important for all times, of course, but it is especially important in our time as Pope Francis has observed: “Marriage and the family are in crisis today.”34 In light of the fact that “the future of humanity passes by way of the family,”35 this is a crisis for the whole human race. When Pope Francis invited the Church to focus her attention on Saint Joseph during the year that commemorates the 150th anniversary of Blessed Pius IX’s declaration that Saint Joseph is Protector of the Church, he invited us implicitly to focus our attention on the Holy Family and the essential role of the family in God’s plan of salvation. For one thing, we find in that family a school of discipleship that is important for every individual Christian: “Nazareth is a kind of school where we may begin to discover what Christ’s life was like and even to understand his Gospel. Here we can observe and ponder the simple appeal of the way God’s Son came to be known, profound yet full of hidden meaning. And gradually we may even learn to imitate him.”36 Just as importantly, we find there the model of family life that needs to be promoted and fostered today. This was a special task that Pope Saint John Paul II entrusted to the Church with his apostolic exhortation on the family in 1981, Familiaris Consortio. He taught about the dangers and evils that menace it. He acknowledged the temptations to discouragement and distress at the growth of difficulties. He saw how the family is being led away from its original position and true orientation and stated firmly: “They must follow Christ.” For this reason he exhorted the children of the Church to take concrete action to show special love to the family and explained: “Loving the family means being able to appreciate its values and capabilities, fostering them always.”37 Like Pope Francis has done for us in declaring a year of Saint Joseph, Pope John Paul II also directed the attention of the Church to the Holy Family in order to carry out this solemn task of protecting and promoting 33 34 35 36 37 RC, §7, quoting Pope Saint Paul VI, Discourse to the “Equipes Notre-Dame” Movement, §7. Pope Francis, Address at the International Colloquium on the Complementarity between Man and Woman sponsored by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, November 17, 2014, §2. Pope Saint John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio [FC], Apostolic Exhortation on the Role of the Christian Family in the Modern World (1981), §86. Pope Saint Paul VI, Homily in the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth during Pilgrimage to the Holy Land, January 5, 1964, papalencyclicals.net/ paul06/p6reflect.htm. FC, §86. 74 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. the family. He sees it as a key for helping Christian families to fulfill his call to “become what [they] are.”38 The Holy Family provides the template for human families, because Christ always lived at its center: “Through God’s mysterious design, it was in that family that the Son of God spent long years of a hidden life. It is therefore the prototype and example for all Christian families.” It is also the hope for human families because of its greatness. This was a greatness that appeared in a very ordinary way, worked out in the daily details of family life. For this reason, Pope John Paul II, who was a great lover of humanity, saw in the Holy Family an unfailing source of support for human families in all their daily trials: “It glorified God in an incomparably exalted and pure way. And it will not fail to help Christian families—indeed, all the families in the world—to be faithful to their day-to-day duties, to bear the cares and tribulations of life, to be open and generous to the needs of others, and to fulfill with joy the plan of God in their regard.” When we consider again the fact that God entrusted his Son not only to an immaculate Mother but also to a father, it also shows us the importance of sexual complementarity for reflecting God’s beauty and for raising God’s Son. As Pope Francis stated in a colloquium on the topic of the complementarity of man and woman: “This complementarity lies at the foundation of marriage and the family, which is the first school. . . . Thus, complementarity becomes a great treasure. It is not only an asset but is also a thing of beauty.”39 Not only a thing of beauty, revealing the image and likeness in the communion of this complementarity, Pope Francis asserted the very points we were considering earlier in the importance of both mother and father for raising a child to the fullness of human maturity. This is the normative pattern, re-established in the Holy Family at the beginning of the new creation. It is a pattern of complementarity, with both father and mother caring for a child, such that a child has a right to this most perfect care: Children have a right to grow up in a family with a father and a mother capable of creating a suitable environment for the child’s growth and emotional development. This is why, in the Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, I stressed the “indispensable” contribution of marriage to society, a contribution which “transcends the feelings and momentary needs of the couple” (n. 66). 38 39 FC, §17. Pope Francis, Address at the International Colloquium on the Complementarity between Man and Woman, §1. Saint Joseph and the Indispensable Role of the Holy Family 75 And this is why I am grateful to you for the emphasis that your colloquium has placed on the benefits that marriage can provide children, the spouses themselves, and society.40 To lose sight of the essential role of the family in God’s plan of salvation is fatal for the human race. It is for this reason that Pope Francis encouraged intellectuals, in particular, not to leave this theme of sexual complementarity aside or to make it secondary, but to focus on it for the sake of “a more free and just society.” He raised concerns about the new threats to children, the family and consequently to the human race. He centered his concerns around the current efforts to relativize or eliminate the importance of the sexual difference between men and women: I ask myself, if the so-called gender theory is not, at the same time, an expression of frustration and resignation, which seeks to cancel out sexual difference because it no longer knows how to confront it. Yes, we risk taking a step backwards. The removal of difference in fact creates a problem, not a solution. 41 This helps us to see again how important it is for us to expand our view from the beautiful and important relationship of Jesus and Mary to the fuller perspective of the Holy Family. How beautifully Joseph and Mary, in their preeminent holiness along with the fragility of their humanity, can exemplify precisely what Pope Francis says here and also intercede for those who are struggling: In order to resolve the problems in their relationships, men and women need to speak to one another more, listen to each other more, get to know one another better, love one another more. They must treat each other with respect and cooperate in friendship. On this human basis, sustained by the grace of God, it is possible to plan a lifelong marital and familial union. The marital and familial bond is a serious matter, and it is so for everyone not just for believers. I would urge intellectuals not to leave this theme aside, as if it had to become secondary in order to foster a more free and just society.42 40 41 42 Pope Francis, Address at the International Colloquium on the Complementarity Between Man and Woman, §3. Pope Francis, Address at the International Colloquium on the Complementarity Between Man and Woman §3. Pope Francis, General Audience, “The Family no. 10: Male and Female (I),” April 15, 2015. 76 Boniface Hicks, O.S.B. Like Saint John Paul II, Pope Francis sees that the protection of the family, particularly in regard to the complementarity of male and female as the necessary composition of marriage, is a critical part of the Church’s mission today: “The social devaluation for the stable and generative alliance between man and woman is certainly a loss for everyone. We must return marriage and the family to the place of honour!”43 What better way to behold the great place of honor that marriage holds than to see that God entrusted his Son to a marriage. In his eternal plan of salvation, marriage was not an after-thought. On the contrary, it was at the beginning of creation and at the beginning of redemption, and it continues to be a sign that always points to the eternal marriage of the Bride and the Lamb (see Rev 21:9–10; 22:17). It is not easy to live out holy marriages and to fight for the place of honor that marriage should hold and to resist the many strong voices that push for various alternatives. All the same, the Holy Father exhorts us: “The responsibility of guarding this covenant between man and woman is ours, although we are sinners and are wounded, confused and humiliated, discouraged and uncertain; it is nevertheless for us believers a demanding and gripping vocation in today’s situation.”44 And to help us he gave us a year of Saint Joseph to bring the Holy Family back into focus. In responding to these summons and taking up our own particular role, we find clarity, insight, strength, and support in the Holy Family. With Pope Saint John Paul II and Pope Francis, with Blessed Pius IX, Pope Leo XIII, and with all the popes in between, we can entrust the Church’s mission and in a particular way the health and integrity of the family to the loving prayer N&V and care of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. 43 44 Pope Francis, General Audience, “The Family no. 11: Male and Female (II),” April 22, 2015. Pope Francis, “The Family, no. 11: Male and Female (II).” Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 77–99 77 Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us Andrew Hofer, O.P., and Jonah Teller, O.P. Dominican House of Studies Washington, DC The eternal Word’s Hypostatic Union with human nature in the womb of the Virgin Mary leads us to consider the dignity, holiness, and veneration of the Mother of God. The dignity, holiness, and veneration of Saint Joseph, united to Our Lady through their marriage bond, can also be seen in terms of his particular connection with the Hypostatic Union.1 Tradition certainly 1 For twentieth-century Thomistic Josephology, the authors are especially indebted to the works of Boniface Llamera, O.P., and James J. Davis, O.P. For the former, see Llamera, Saint Joseph, trans. Sister Mary Elizabeth, O.P. (London: B. Herder, 1962), which is a translation of much of Teología de San José (Madrid: La Editorial Catόlica, 1953), which came after Llamera’s Angelicum doctoral dissertation directed by Francisco Muñiz, O.P., and publicly defended on June 20, 1942. Llamera’s Teología de San José includes the Latin text, with a Spanish translation, of the first treatise on St. Joseph, the lengthy Summa de donis Sancti Ioseph by the Dominican Isidore de Isolano of Bologna (1522) on 363–653, although Sister Mary Elizabeth’s translation does not include Isidore’s text. The latter, Davis, gave Teología de San José a positive review in The Thomist 18, no. 3 (1955): 424–28. Davis himself was to become a leading Thomistic Josephologist for his invaluable dissertation, which was published as A Thomistic Josephology, Theologica Montis Regii 51 (Montréal: Center of Research, St. Joseph’s Oratory, 1967), after publications of chapters in Cahiers de Joséphologie 9, no. 2 (1961), through 14, no. 2 (1966). Both treat St. Joseph’s holiness immediately after dignity, and veneration is treated last. For St. Thomas’s sense of dignity, see more recently Lawrence Dewan, “Some Notes on St. Thomas’s Use of Dignitas,” Nova et Vetera (English) 11 (2013): 663–72. For St. Thomas on the holiness of deification, see Daria Spezzano, The Glory of God’s Grace: Deification according to St. Thomas Aquinas (Ave Maria, FL: Sapientia Press, 2015). For St. Thomas on veneration of saints, with special attention to relics, see Anton ten Klooster, “‘Due honor to their relics’: Thomas Aquinas as Teacher and 78 Hofer and Teller conveyed Saint Joseph’s unique relation to the Incarnation. According to Saint John Chrysostom’s preaching on Matthew 1, for example, Saint Joseph “ministers to the whole dispensation” (διακονεῖται τῇ οἰκονομίᾳ πάσῃ), a pregnant phrase that Pope Francis recently highlighted in his apostolic letter Patris Corde.2 Many theologians since the seventeenth century have spoken of Joseph in “the hypostatic union’s order,” a phrase often shortened to “hypostatic order.”3 Establishing right thinking on the hypostatic order became the key for ascertaining Saint Joseph’s unique place in providence. One of the most influential Josephologists of the twentieth century, Boniface Llamera, writes: “The most significant question in the entire theology of St. Joseph is: ‘Can the holy Patriarch be included in the order of the hypostatic union?’”4 Llamera answered affirmatively, though with several important distinctions as we will see. While preserving many benefits of Llamera’s distinctions, we seek in this essay to resituate our understanding of Saint Joseph’s holiness in divine providence and our veneration of him within a Thomistic devotion to the saints. First, we restate from the work of modern Josephology how Saint Joseph holds a unique place vis-à-vis the Hypostatic Union. Theologians became indebted to Juan de Cartagena and Francisco Suárez in their language of a “hypostatic union’s order.” In formulating the concept of this order, these early modern theologians explicitly separated the Hypostatic Union’s order from the order of sanctifying grace, a significant act that has not received sufficient attention for its detriment to the theology of grace.5 Second, we argue that Saint Joseph’s relationship to 2 3 4 5 Object of Veneration,” European Journal for the Study of Thomas Aquinas 37 (2019): 1–17, at 3–5. Pope Francis, Patris Corde, Apostolic Letter on the 150th Anniversary of the Proclamation of Saint Joseph as Patron of the Universal Church (December 8, 2020), §1. See St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew 5.3 (Patrologia Graeca [PG], 57:58). The word hypostasis, not found in Aristotle’s thinking for “particular substance” or “subject,” came to be understood as that in the Trinitarian and Christological controversies. The term, as particular substance or subject, may be used for a rock, a tree, a squirrel, Joseph, or each of the persons of the Blessed Trinity. A person is a rational hypostasis. Cyril of Alexandria coined the phrase “union according to the hypostasis,” or Hypostatic Union, during the Nestorian controversy to underscore that Christ is only one hypostasis, who is the eternal Word. For St. Thomas, who identifies hypostasis as a synonym of suppositum, see Summa theologiae [ST] III, q. 2, aa. 3–4. The union of the eternal Word with human nature took place in his own hypostasis or person. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 90. Lively debates in scholarship pertain to the controversies of the orders of nature Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 79 the Hypostatic Union must be seen not as separate from, but intimately related to the co-assumed perfection of Christ’s habitual sanctifying grace. The habitual grace necessary for Christ’s soul, different from the grace of union, is his capital grace for the salvation of the Mother of God, Saint Joseph, and all the saints in Christ’s body. Third, we review how our veneration of the Mother of God, Saint Joseph, and all the saints comes as a consequence of the Hypostatic Union. Saint Thomas gives a scale of adoration in Summa theologiae [ST] III, q. 25, that includes not only latria for Christ, but also different kinds of worship, secundum quid, extending to hyperdulia for the Mother of God and veneration of holy relics—all as consequences of the Hypostatic Union. In our conclusion, we answer an objection and emphasize the significance of our proposal for the theology of grace. By discarding talk of “the hypostatic order” but keeping several important distinctions made about Saint Joseph’s intimate relationship to the Word incarnate, second only to that of the Virgin Mother of God, we wish to promote devotion to Saint Joseph from a Thomistic perspective, one that emphasizes an appreciation for the order of sanctifying grace and what God does for all the saints through the Holy Spirit’s mission in Christ’s capital grace. Modern Josephology: Saint Joseph’s Unique Place vis-à-vis the Hypostatic Union Contemporaries Juan de Cartagena and Francisco Suárez introduced the teaching on the “hypostatic union’s order” as fundamentally different from the order of the grace that makes one pleasing to God, commonly called sanctifying grace.6 They include Saint Joseph in this hypostatic order, placing him after the Savior’s human nature and the Virgin Mary. De Cartagena writes: Although the ministry of the apostolate in the order of sanctifying grace [in ordine gratiae gratum facientis], if I may speak in the custom of theologians, holds the supreme position of dignity in the Church, according to the words of St. Paul (1 Cor 12): “And God indeed has placed some in the Church, first apostles . . . ,” neverthe- 6 and grace. Cognizant of that, we want to draw attention to the early modern shift of defining a “hypostatic order,” inclusive of St. Joseph, separate from the order of sanctifying grace. Juan de Cartagena died a Franciscan in 1617 or 1618 (sources vary on the year), and the famed Jesuit theologian Francisco Suárez died in 1617. Llamera seems to give chronological primacy to Juan de Cartagena’s witness. 80 Hofer and Teller less, in the order of grace of the hypostatic union [in ordine tamen gratiae unionis hypostaticae], much more perfect than the former, Christ’s humanity united with the Person of the Word holds first place, the Virgin Mother of the Word is in second place, and St. Joseph is third.7 De Cartagena continues some lines later: Since therefore Saint Joseph occupies the lowest place in this most excellent order of the hypostatic union [in hoc excellentissimo unionis hypostaticae ordine], and the lowest of the highest exceeds the highest of the lowest, as the lowest of the seraphim exceeds the highest of the cherubim, it is a consequence that not only Joseph’s ministry far supersedes the ministry of the apostles, but also the corresponding grace supersedes the grace of the apostles.8 Similarly, Suárez writes on ST III, q. 29, on the espousal of the Mother of God, in this way: Certain offices [ministeria] belong to the order of sanctifying grace [ad ordinem gratiae gratum facientis], and in this order, as I understand it, the apostles ranked highest, and needed more graces freely given and gifts of wisdom than others did. But there are offices (ministeria) that belong to the order of the hypostatic union [attingunt ordinem unionis hypostaticae] which is in its kind more perfect, as I said when speaking of the dignity of the Mother of God. Now, in this order, though in the lowest place, I find the office [ministerium] of St. Joseph.9 It would be difficult to overestimate Suárez’s influence on the subsequent theology of Saint Joseph. Francis Filas writes: “Among modern authors who have written on Saint Joseph’s holiness the treatment is strikingly similar and at times almost identical. The reason for this similarity is probably the same as existed with regard to Saint Joseph’s dignity—the 7 8 9 Llamera, Saint Joseph, 98; the Latin text is not in the English translation, but it can be found in Llamera, Teología de San José, 123n13. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 98; the Latin text is not in the English translation, but it can be found in Llamera, Teología de San José, 124n13. Francisco Suárez, S. J., Commentaria ac Disputationes in Tertiam Partem D. Thomae, q. 29, a. 2, disp. 8, sect. 1, no. 10 (Opera Omnia, vol. 19, p. 125); trans. Davis, Thomistic Josephology, 187 (trans. altered). Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 81 existence of a common theological source, Francis Suarez.”10 Thomist after Thomist follows Suárez’s lead in this respect. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, for example, writes: “St. Joseph’s mission is evidently higher than the order of nature—even of angelic nature. But is it simply of the order of grace, as were that of St. John the Baptist who prepared the way of salvation, and that the apostles had in the Church for the sanctification of souls, and that more particular mission of the founders of religious orders?” 11 Garrigou-Lagrange continues: “If we examine the question carefully we shall see that Saint Joseph’s mission surpassed the order of grace. It borders, by its term, on the hypostatic order, which is constituted by the mystery of the Incarnation.”12 To support this position, Garrigou-Lagrange cites various authorities, including Suárez’s commentary on ST III, q. 29.13 Llamera continues this interpretation, and invokes Cardinal Cajetan 10 11 12 13 Francis L. Filas, S.J., Joseph Most Just: Theological Questions about St. Joseph (Milwaukee, WI: Bruce, 1956), 41. See Gregory F. LaNave’s forthcoming “The Holiness of St. Joseph,” Josephinum Journal of Theology, 27 (2020): 3–13, at 5n9, for this observation. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., The Mother of the Saviour and Our Interior Life, trans. Bernard J. Kelly, C.S.Sp. (Dublin: Golden Eagle, 1948), 326. LaNave writes: “Here we come to what the commentators, following Suarez, call Joseph’s belonging to the ‘order of the hypostatic union.’ We need not, for our purposes, address the discussion of the matter, but it is worth noting that it is for this reason that commentators commonly speak of Joseph as exceeding in dignity all of those who belong to the prophetic order or the apostolic order, and even all of the angels. For example, commenting on the superiority of Joseph to John the Baptist (and confronting the difficulty posed by Matt 11:11, ‘I say to you, among those born of women there has risen no one greater than John the Baptist’), Boniface Llamera says, ‘The ministry of St. Joseph . . . is raised to the order of the hypostatic union because it is proximately ordained to the execution of the Incarnation. It is necessarily bound to this order by divine disposition, in such wise that no other saint was more united to Christ than he. The ministry of the Baptist, on the other hand, is simply of the order of grace. It is not immediately ordained to Christ, but to the salvation of souls through Christ’ (Saint Joseph, 157)” (“The Holiness of St. Joseph,” 11n23). Garrigou-Lagrange, Mother of the Saviour, 326. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Mother of the Saviour, 327. Another significant authority in this respect appears on 326–27: Giacomo Sinabaldi, titular Bishop of Tiberias and secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Studies, author of La Grandezza di San Giuseppe (Rome: Biblioteca del Messaggero del cuore di Maria, 1927). On 328, Garrigou-Lagrange quotes Sinabaldi that St. Joseph’s mission “pertains by its term to the hypostatic order, not through intrinsic physical and immediate cooperation, but through extrinsic moral and mediate (through Mary) co-operation, which is, however, really and truly co-operation.” 82 Hofer and Teller as a precursor for the development by de Cartagena and Suárez. In his commentary on the opening article of the tertia pars, Cajetan says this: “The love [amor] of the Supreme Goodness for his creature is so most excellent that he has not been satisfied with communicating himself with it according to the natural order of the creature [secundum naturalem ordinem creaturae], by creating the universe, nor has he been satisfied with communicating himself to the creature according to the order of grace [secundum ordinem gratiae], by elevating it to the sharing of divine nature.” Cajetan continues: “He has willed to raise it to that one [ad id unum] which was lacking, one which creatures could neither suspect nor conceive, namely, to the divine personality; and this is the third and highest mode [modum] of his communication.” Cajetan then states the significance: “In this last manner, God gives to his creature, not a greater likeness, not some created gift of the natural or supernatural order, but his own Person according to his proper subsistence which he has in himself, in such a way that the created nature and God constitute one Person, and the creature, man, is in reality the Incarnate Word, which is God.”14 Cajetan continues to use Aquinas’s language of the order of nature and the order of grace, and seems to suggest an “order” in the Incarnation for the third and highest levels of God communicating himself—but he does not explicitly call it an order wherein we find Christ’s humanity, the Mother of God, and Saint Joseph. In light of Cajetan and other authorities, especially following developments seen in de Cartagena and Suárez, Llamera investigates the best way of speaking of Saint Joseph’s cooperation in the hypostatic order. He distinguishes a double consideration: I. St. Joseph cooperated in the constitution of the hypostatic order in a true and singular manner, extrinsically, morally, and mediately. II. The cooperation of St. Joseph in the conservation of the hypostatic union was direct, immediate and necessary.15 Llamera distinguishes first: “in fieri, or the constitution of the order of the hypostatic union,” and then “in facto esse, or the conservation of the same [mismo].”16 Llamera finds that the greater difficulty regards the former. 14 15 16 Tommaso de Vio Cajetan’s comments on ST III, q. 1, a. 1, are found in vol. 11, pp. 8–9, of the Leonine edition; trans. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 92 (trans. altered). Llamera, Saint Joseph, 105; Llamera, Teología de San José, 131. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 105 (trans. altered). The published English translation substitutes “order” for mismo. No one, and not even Christ’s death, could separate the Hypostatic Union. It seems puzzling that Llamera would in the second Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 83 For Llamera, when it comes to constituting the Hypostatic Union’s order, this work is, in the final analysis, possible to God alone as he unites a human nature to himself in the person of the Word. In the work of conceiving and generating Christ’s body, while it is primarily the work of the Trinity, the Blessed Virgin Mary cooperates in this work of the conception and generation of Christ’s body. In doing so, Mary herself contributes to the mystery of the Hypostatic Union. In this way of thinking, her spiritual and bodily roles in relating to the mystery of the Hypostatic Union fall within the “hypostatic order.” How does Saint Joseph enter into the hypostatic order according to this strain of Thomistic Josephology? The first distinction is between pertaining intrinsically or extrinsically. According to Llamera, “to belong intrinsically to the hypostatic union is to concur in a proper and immediate manner in the constitution of the substance of the Incarnation or physical cooperation in it.”17 The Blessed Virgin Mary pertains intrinsically to the Incarnation. Belonging extrinsically to the order of the Hypostatic Union, Llamera continues, involves “the placing of some singular act relative to its constitution, in such a way that this act is, by divine disposition, necessary for the execution of the union.”18 Llamera is careful to specify this extrinsic sort of belonging: such terminology refers not to absolutely any sort of contribution; if it did, all of the patriarchs, the prophets, and the rest of those involved in the happenings of the Old Testament would belong extrinsically to this same order (and Llamera admits that, in fact, they do, though only broadly speaking). Instead, external belonging to the hypostatic order “is rather a unique act having a very special relation to the hypostatic union.”19 Thus, according to Llamera, as opposed to Mary’s intrinsic participation, Saint Joseph belongs extrinsically to the hypostatic order. Another distinction is between physical and moral participation.20 To participate physically, in this distinction, one must contribute some of the matter involved in the Incarnation. Participating morally requires a free 17 18 19 20 statement of the double conclusion speak of the conservation of the Hypostatic Union. See Catechism of the Catholic Church [CCC] §626, quoting St. John Damacene, De fide orthodoxa 3.27 (PG, 94: 1098A). Llamera, Saint Joseph, 93. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 93. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 94. This way of distinguishing is found in Llamera, Saint Joseph, 102–13. Llamera writes, for example, that Joseph’s cooperation in the constitution of the Hypostatic Union “was not physical” (109). The term “physical” here has the sense of materiality, but we can recall that “physical” in the Thomistic tradition can mean the motion of potency to act. 84 Hofer and Teller act of the will. In this case, Mary participated in the hypostatic order both physically and morally, whereas Joseph participated only morally. Finally, one can distinguish between immediate and mediate participation. Mary participates immediately, and Joseph mediately. The Blessed Virgin Mary’s cooperation, then, in the constitution of the hypostatic order was moral, physical, immediate, and intrinsic. That is to say, she freely gave her consent at the Annunciation (“fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum”); she included in this consent the very matter of her body, from which would be formed the body of God enfleshed; and she did all of this not as the principal cause but as a knowing and willing instrumental cause, thus serving as a passive principle of the Incarnation. With respect to the hypostatic order’s constitution, Joseph’s participation is moral, mediate, and extrinsic. We will examine these modes of participation. First is Saint Joseph’s moral participation in the Hypostatic Union’s order. The decisions of Saint Joseph play a significant role in God’s plan for the constitution of the Incarnation. Saint Joseph’s involvement in the hypostatic order depends primarily upon his relation to Mary as her true spouse. By virtue of the divine plan, it was necessary that Christ should be born within the marriage of the Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph. Saint Joseph’s consent was necessary for the existence of the marriage. In this way, he exercised a certain influence over the Virgin Mary’s divine maternity and, through it, over the establishment of the Hypostatic Union. Through Saint Joseph’s consent to the marriage, the working of the Holy Spirit was concealed until the proper time, and Mary was enabled to remain a virgin while yet married. Llamera supports the position of Joseph Bover, who observes that “The Blessed Virgin could not have preserved her virginity, being married, unless St. Joseph consented to it and relinquished his strict rights.”21 In freely complying and assenting to enter into marriage with the Virgin Mary, Saint Joseph, by this act of moral cooperation, played an influential and meritorious role in the realization of the Incarnation for our salvation. Second, Saint Joseph participated in the hypostatic order mediately, by virtue of his relation to Mary. Because of his relation to the Blessed Virgin as truly her spouse, Saint Joseph also exercised a certain influence regarding Christ, the legitimate fruit of their marriage. An early text from Saint Thomas Aquinas is helpful for understanding the composition of the Holy Family. Studying the marriage of the Mother of God and Saint Joseph in his commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, 21 P. Joseph Bover, De cultu S. Ioseph amplificando (Barcelona: Eugenes Subirana, 1928), 32 (trans. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 105). Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 85 Saint Thomas considers the objection that, since the child raised within the marriage (i.e., Jesus) was not the effect of a marital act, the marriage thus lacked the good of offspring with the result that the marriage was not complete. Saint Thomas responds: “A child is not called the good of marriage only because he is generated through marriage, but also inasmuch as he is accepted and educated in marriage; and in this way the good of this marriage was a child, but not in the first way.”22 Human generation alone does not constitute a child as a good of marriage; he must also be welcomed into the family, nurtured, and educated, and all of these things were preeminently true of the Lord Jesus in the family of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph. Their marriage was complete, though not consummated by a conjugal act. Finally, Saint Joseph’s participation in the constitution of the hypostatic order was extrinsic. We should immediately dispel any sense of arbitrariness from the present use of the term “extrinsic.” It is true that Saint Joseph was not involved in the constitution of Jesus’s conception in any physical or immediate way, so his cooperation was not intrinsic. However, Saint Joseph’s special paternity in relation to Christ was ordained by God. It is far from a chance occurrence. De Cartagena points out that “without [Joseph’s] marriage, the honor of the Mother and the Son would have been imperiled.”23 Saint Joseph plays a necessary role in establishing the conditions in which Mary is both virgin and mother in a marital bond and in which Christ is the offspring of a true family. Thus far, we have shown Llamera’s analysis of Saint Joseph’s role in the constitution of the Hypostatic Union. In the case of Joseph’s role in conserving the hypostatic order, Llamera says it is direct, immediate, and necessary. Showing his participation in the conservation of the order is a straightforward task for this Thomistic Josephology; it is abundantly clear in the Gospels. Saint Joseph clearly fulfills his duty to protect and provide for the Christ Child and Our Lady, as is seen, for example, in Joseph’s taking Mary into his own home at the behest of the angel, his conducting 22 23 St. Thomas Aquinas, In IV sent. d. 30, q. 2, a. 2, ad 4, trans. from Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, Book IV, Distinctions 26–42, ed. Aquinas Institute, trans. Beth Mortensen (Green Bay, WI: Aquinas Institute, 2017). Juan de Cartagena, De Despons. B.V., homily 7 (trans. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 110. Llamera’s great debt to Juan continues, such as in what Llamera calls “a beautiful comparison” by de Cartagena: “As the Holy Spirit, in the heavenly Trinity, is the third Person by reason of origin, so in the earthly trinity of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph the holy Patriarch holds the third place in order of dignity; and as the Holy Spirit is the fount of love and life, so St. Joseph, nourishing the Child Jesus, is presented to us, in a certain sense, as the principle of His life” (trans. on 112). 86 Hofer and Teller his pregnant wife safely to Bethlehem, his guidance of the Holy Family in the flight to Egypt, his fulfilling of the law in presenting Jesus in the temple, and his diligent search for Christ when Our Lord stayed behind in the temple during their Passover trip to Jerusalem. Saint Thomas writes in ST III, q. 24, a. 4: “Eternal predestination covers not only that which is to be accomplished in time, but also the mode and order in which it is to be accomplished in time.”24 The Incarnation was not established by the divine plan merely in some abstract way, with gaps left to be filled in at random when the time came. God planned, from all eternity, the time, mode, and order by which his Son would come into the world. That plan included, specifically and from all eternity, Joseph of Nazareth. Garrigou-Lagrange comments on the scope of this plan established by divine providence: “It was established from eternity that the Word of God made flesh would be marvelously born of Mary, who was ever Virgin and also united to Joseph the just by the power of a true marriage.”25 By virtue of the place allotted to him by providence—that he should be the true spouse of the Virgin Mary and lawfully exercise fatherhood over the Incarnate Word—and by his free cooperation with that plan, Saint Joseph plays a necessary role in the constitution and conservation of the Hypostatic Union, according to this Thomistic Josephology. As a result, as Llamera puts it, “by his consent and with his whole life and all his works, St. Joseph came closer to Christ than all other men, so that he can be included in the order of the hypostatic union.”26 While preserving the benefits of several of these distinctions of Joseph’s proximity to the Hypostatic Union, we want to put aside the notion inherited from de Cartagena and Suárez that there exists an order of the Hypostatic Union, inclusive of Christ’s humanity, the Mother of God, and Saint Joseph, separate from the order of sanctifying grace. To understand the importance of doing so, we need to consider the Hypostatic Union and Christ’s sanctifying grace as capital grace. 24 25 26 ST III, q. 24, a. 4 (ST is quoted from the translation of the Fathers of the English Province in the common domain, and may be altered at times). Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., “De Praestantia Sancti Ioseph Inter Omnes Sanctos,” Angelicum 5, no. 2 (1928): 206: “Statutum enim erat ab aeterno Verbum Dei caro factum mirabiliter nasciturum ex Maria semper Virgine ac Ioseph iusto vi matrimonii veri coniuncta.” Llamera, Saint Joseph, 101–2 (emphasis added). Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 87 The Hypostatic Union and Christ’s Capital Grace for the Mother of God, Saint Joseph, and All the Saints Contrary to the established view of the earlier Thomistic Josephologists discussed above, we argue that Saint Joseph’s relation to the Hypostatic Union must not be separated from the order of sanctifying grace. It is in fact the sanctifying grace in Christ’s humanity that establishes the holiness of every saint, most prominently the Mother of God and Saint Joseph. Christ’s habitual grace is also the capital grace that overflows from the incarnate Lord and sanctifies all the holy ones of the new and old covenants. Dominic Legge’s excellent work on the Incarnation shows that Suárez’s understanding of the Hypostatic Union sidelines Christ’s habitual sanctifying grace. Legge himself does not address Saint Joseph and the “hypostatic order,” but we can apply his work to our present inquiry. In The Trinitarian Christology of St. Thomas Aquinas, Legge identifies a novel approach of Jesuit theologians in the first century of their society’s existence, an approach that altered what Dominican commentators had continued from Saint Thomas in defending Christ’s habitual grace from the errors of Blessed Duns Scotus. Legge writes: In the early seventeenth century, Francisco Suarez offered the definitive formulation of this new approach: “The humanity of Christ, or Christ as man, formally, by virtue of the grace of union itself, was absolutely and simply holy and pleasing to God.” Suarez held that, while habitual grace did in fact flow from the hypostatic union, this was neither necessary nor the true basis for Christ’s human sanctity. “God could have assumed a human nature without habitual grace, although he could not assume it without making it pleasing to him.”27 Legge continues to quote Suárez and then shows the historical consequence of this new approach: “Christ would not need any created grace in order to be holy and pleasing to God, even as man. . . . Because of the sanctification [of Christ’s soul and body by the grace of union], habitual grace was not necessary to Christ.” From this point forward, both non-Dominicans and Dominicans alike largely repeat Suarez’s formulation.28 27 28 Dominic Legge, O.P., The Trinitarian Christology of St Thomas Aquinas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 139, quoting Suárez, Commentaria ac Disputationes in Tertiam Partem D. Thomae, q. 7, a. 1, disp. 18, no. 1, no. 5 (Opera Omnia, vol. 17). Legge, Trinitarian Christology, 139, quoting Suárez, Commentaria ac 88 Hofer and Teller Aquinas says explicitly that, as we confess Christ to be God incarnate, we must also say that Christ himself is within the order of grace. One place this claim appears is during Saint Thomas’s discussion of Christ’s vision of God during his life on earth. Within that question, an objection argues that “the rational power of the soul such as the soul of Christ is below the intellective power of an angel, as is plain from Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, chap. 4. Therefore, the soul of Christ does not see the Word more perfectly than the angels.”29 Rather than introducing the idea of a hypostatic order to explain what we call the “beatific vision” in Christ’s soul from the moment of his conception,30 Aquinas refers to the order of grace: The vision of the divine essence exceeds the natural potency of any creature, as was said in the prima pars. And therefore the degrees thereof depend rather on the order of grace [secundum ordinem gratiae] in which Christ is most excellent, than on the order of nature [secundum naturae], according to which the angelic nature is preferred to the human.31 Again, Christ is most excellent in the order of grace. Should we say that this is sanctifying grace? Sanctifying grace has the most intimate connections with the grace of the Hypostatic Union, and both are found in Christ himself. In the last article of ST III, q. 6, on the order of the Son of God’s assumption of human nature, Aquinas teaches that Christ’s habitual grace was not the medium of the assumption, but rather an effect following upon the union. The grace of union (gratia unionis) “is the personal being [esse personale] that is given freely from above to the human nature in the person of the Word, and is the term of the assumption.”32 In other words, the grace of union is nothing less than the eternal uncreated being of the hypostasis of the Son. The habitual grace [gratia habitualis] of Christ pertains “to the spiritual holiness of the man in an effect following the union, according to 29 30 31 32 Disputationes in Tertiam Partem D. Thomae, q. 7, a. 1, disp. 18, sec. 1, no. 3. Legge says that John of St. Thomas did not follow this position, and his Cursus Theologicus on the tertia pars, which has it, was added by a student after John’s death. ST III, q. 10, a. 4, obj. 2. St. Thomas never uses the phrase visio beatifica. He uses visio beatificans 5 times, visio beata or visio beatorum 38 times, and visio Dei 241 times. See Jean-Pierre Torrell, O.P., “La vision de Dieu ‘per essentiam’ selon saint Thomas d’Aquin,” in his Recherches Thomasiennes (Paris: Vrin, 2000), 177–97, at 177. ST III, q. 10, a. 4, ad 2. ST III, q. 6, a. 6. Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 89 John 1: ‘We saw his glory . . . as it were of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.’ By this we are given to understand that because this man, as a result of the union, is the only-begotten of the Father, he is full of grace and truth.”33 Consider this point in light of what Aquinas says in ST I, q. 43, about the invisible divine missions: “The divine person is fittingly sent in the sense that he exists newly in anyone, and he is given as possessed by anyone. Neither of these exists except according to sanctifying grace.”34 As Legge has shown, for Saint Thomas, Christ’s “habitual grace,” which is his “sanctifying grace,” sanctifies his own humanity, pace Garrigou-Lagrange and some recent interpreters.35 Working from Saint Thomas’s texts, Legge insists that “Christ is made ‘formally holy’ by the same grace by which he justifies others, namely, his fullness of habitual grace.”36 Aquinas gives three reasons in logical order for the necessity of Christ’s habitual grace: the first is in relation to God; the second concerns Christ’s soul itself; and the third is in relation to us.37 First, Aquinas considers the union of Christ’s soul with the Word of God: “For the nearer any recip33 34 35 36 37 ST III, q. 6, a. 6. ST I, q. 43, a. 3 (emphasis added). Legge, Trinitarian Christology, 140n36: “The assertion that ‘St Thomas never calls Christ’s habitual grace “sanctifying grace,” because Christ’s sanctification comes from the grace of union,’ Ocáriz, Mateo Seco, and Riestra, The Mystery of Jesus Christ, 181, citing Garrigou-Lagrange, De Christo Salvatore at 182, is likewise incorrect. We have found at least two instances where Aquinas speaks of Christ as receiving sanctifying grace. See, e.g., STh III, q. 34, a.1; In Ioan. c. 3, lect. 6 (no. 543).” Garrigou-Lagrange believes that Christ received sanctifying grace, but he sees this as other than the grace immediately sanctifying Christ’s humanity by the Hypostatic Union. See ch. 11, “The Sanctity of Jesus,” in Garrigou-Lagrange, Our Saviour and His Love for Us, trans. A. Bouchard (Rockford, IL: TAN, 1998 [repr.]), 125–42: “The sanctity of Jesus, like the grace of union with the Word, is not only substantial, but it is uncreated” (135); “His soul lives in a special order, the order of the hypostatic union, the order of personal and substantial life of God, wherein He is placed by the grace of His union with the Word” (136); “From His substantial and uncreated sanctity our Lord derived created sanctifying grace, and this He received in its fullness” (137). For Garrigou-Lagrange’s lengthy argument that “Christ's human nature is formally sanctified by the substantial and increate grace of union,” see his Christ the Savior: A Commentary on the Third Part of St. Thomas’ Theological Summa, trans. Bede Rose, O.S.B. (St. Louis, MO: Herder, 1950), 248–57 (quote at 257). Legge, Trinitarian Christology, 141. See ST III, q. 8, a. 5 ad 2–3; q. 34, a. 3. Also, Legge writes: “Just as the Word is eternally the Word who breathes forth Love, so the Word in Christ’s humanity breathes forth Love to that humanity, namely, the Holy Spirit himself with habitual grace and the gift of charity” (152) See ST III, q. 7, a. 1. 90 Hofer and Teller ient is to an inflowing cause, the more does it partake of its influence.” Second, Aquinas speaks of the dignity of Christ’s soul, “whose operations were to attain so closely to God by knowledge and love, to which it is necessary [necesse] for human nature to be raised by grace.” Third, Aquinas turns to Christ’s relation to the human race. Christ, as man, is the “mediator of God and men” (1 Tim 2:5). Therefore, “it behooved [oportebat] him to have grace that would redound into others, in accordance with ‘And of his fullness we have all received grace for grace’ (John 1:16).”38 Our grace, the grace that makes any of us holy and pleasing to God, is nothing less than a participation in Christ’s own habitual grace, which is the Holy Spirit’s invisible mission for the sanctification of humanity, first Christ our Savior’s and then ours for our salvation. This grace is Aquinas’s subject in ST III, q. 8. It is the same grace of Christ’s soul as was treated just prior in question 7, but now understood as the formality of his headship over all. This mystery can be reckoned in terms of our being branches on Christ the True Vine (see John 15:1–17). The Holy Spirit is Lord and Giver of Life, and it is by being in Christ that we receive his Spirit. Another of Legge’s works is helpful here. In his study of the Holy Spirit at Christ’s conception, Legge writes: Christ as man receives “the whole Spirit,” without measure, from the first instant of his conception, and he is therefore holy in his humanity in a unique way. The hypostatic union is the cause of this, but only indirectly; more directly, the principle of Christ’s habitual grace is the Holy Spirit. Moreover, the incarnate Son, both as God and as man, gives the Holy Spirit to the world; this is an aspect of 38 In Domingo Bañez’s dispute with Melchior Cano’s moral theory of sacramental grace, we see the importance of defending Aquinas’s account of the Hypostatic Union for grace. Reginald Lynch, O.P., writes: “Both Cano and Aquinas make reference to Christology in the context of sacramental causality. Aquinas’ understanding of Christic instrumentality is rooted in the instrumentality of the Incarnation itself: when considered in reference to human sanctification, the implications of the hypostatic union unfold, displaying the unified instrumental motion of Christ’s humanity and by extension the sacraments, working towards the finality of grace as instrumental causes under the principal agency of divine causality. By contrast, Cano makes no direct reference to the hypostatic union in the context of sacramental causality; rather than incorporating a sense of instrumentality drawn from this union into his sacramental doctrine, Cano insists on opposing the merits of Christ to physical causality” (The Cleansing of the Heart: The Sacraments as Instrumental Causes in the Thomistic Tradition [Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2017], 186). Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 91 Christ’s capital grace. As man, therefore, Christ is conceived as the fount of the Holy Spirit for the whole world.39 In light of this, return to the question at hand. Saint Joseph’s proximity to the Hypostatic Union should not be understood according to the method of de Cartagena and Suárez, wherein he is found in a hypostatic order separate from the order of sanctifying grace. Saint Joseph’s participation lies within the order of sanctifying grace, in which order we find all the saints. Within this order, and eclipsed only by the very Mother of God, Saint Joseph received a singular participation in Christ’s own sanctifying grace. We must not think little of sanctifying grace.40 For Saint Thomas, “the good of grace in one is worth more than the good of nature in the whole universe.”41 Christ was born of the Virgin, suffered, died, and rose so that our nature might be re-created in the deifying grace of the Holy Spirit and so share in the divine nature. Saint Thomas’s account of deification provides endless riches for thinking about what the Blessed Trinity does for our holiness.42 Commenting on Ephesians 3:20, Aquinas praises the profound mystery in this way: “For the human mind and will could never imagine, understand or ask that God become man, and that man become God and a sharer in the divine nature. But he has done this in us by his power, and it was accomplished in the Incarnation of his Son.”43 We must stress this point: all sanctifying grace is in reference to the 39 40 41 42 43 Dominic Legge, “Incarnate De Spiritu Sancto: Aquinas on the Holy Spirit and Christ’s Conception,” The Thomist 84, no. 2 (2020): 173–205, at 204. Among the notes Legge gives to support his position is this: “Because Christ in a certain way infuses the effect of grace in all rational creatures, he is therefore in a certain manner the principle of all graces according to his humanity, as God is the principle of all being” (De Verit., q. 29, a. 5)” (204n100). While Suárez is different from Bl. Duns Scotus, both denigrate sanctifying grace’s place in how God saves us through the Incarnation. Legge elucidates the significance: “For both Scotus and Suarez, the hypostatic union has no necessary connection to habitual grace, nor does habitual grace have a necessary connection to whether Christ is pleasing to God. The point of difference between them is principally whether, given the hypostatic union, Christ’s humanity is necessarily pleasing to God (Scotus says no, Suarez says yes), but for both of them, Christ’s habitual grace is a separate matter. For both, Christ the God-man could be endowed with habitual grace or not, as God wills, without fundamentally changing the shape of the salvation wrought through the incarnation” (Trinitarian Christology, 141–42.). ST I-II, q. 113, a. 9, ad 2. For the most complete overview, see Spezzano, Glory of God’s Grace. Aquinas, Super Eph 3, lec. 5 (no. 185), trans. Davis, Thomistic Josephology. Spezzano cites this passage to conclude her chapter on Aquinas and Bonaventure in 92 Hofer and Teller Hypostatic Union. The Hypostatic Union, in a sense, establishes the order of grace for those both before and after the Incarnation. The missions of the Son and the Holy Spirit are distinct, but inseparable. This is the mystery of Christ in us and of us in Christ. Colossians also speaks of Christ as “head of the body, the church” (Col 1:18; cf. Eph 1:22). When applying the order, perfection, and power of a head to Christ, Aquinas speaks of the first order in this way: “On account of his nearness to God his grace is the highest and first, though not in time, since all have received grace on account of his grace, according to Romans 8:29.”44 Fittingly, in Redemptoris Custos, Saint John Paul II quotes Saint Thomas’s treatment of capital grace for the Redeemer’s mission of sanctification: “The communion of life between Joseph and Jesus leads us to consider once again the mystery of the Incarnation, precisely in reference to the humanity of Jesus as the efficacious instrument of his divinity for the purpose of sanctifying man.”45 The Pope then quotes Saint Thomas: “By virtue of his divinity, Christ's human actions were salvific for us, causing grace within us, either by merit or by a certain efficacy.”46 How wonderful it is to consider Saint Joseph precisely within the beauty and power of what Christ’s capital grace does for the saints. Honoring the Mother of God, Saint Joseph, and All the Saints as Consequences of the Hypostatic Union If, while maintaining his privileged relationship to the Hypostatic Union, we do away with a separate hypostatic order that positions Saint Joseph above the order of sanctifying grace, what would our honor of him look like and how might that affect our honor of all the saints? Llamera discusses the honor due to Saint Joseph through comparison to the hyperdulia that Saint Thomas shows should be rendered to the Mother of God in ST III, q. 25, a. 5, which asks whether adoration is to be shown to Christ’s mother. About the Virgin Mary’s hyperdulia beyond the cult of dulia given to saints, Llamera writes: “The divine maternity is a dignity of a specifically superior order, because it belongs to the order of the hypostatic union, transcending, intrinsically and physically, the order of creation.”47 About veneration due to Saint Joseph, Llamera writes that 44 45 46 47 The Oxford Handbook of Deification, ed. Paul L. Gavrilyuk, Andrew Hofer, O.P., and Matthew Levering (Oxford: Oxford University Press, forthcoming). ST III, q. 8, a. 1. John Paul II, Redemptoris Custos, Apostolic Exhortation on the Person and Mission of St. Joseph in the Life of Christ and the Church (August 15, 1989), §27. ST III, q. 8, a. 1, ad 1. Llamera, Saint Joseph, 299–300. Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 93 “this cult must be at least that of supreme dulia, since St. Joseph is truly included in the order of the hypostatic union, not physically nor intrinsically, it is true, but morally and extrinsically.”48 Both Llamera and James Davis consider the rightness of granting Saint Joseph the honor called protodulia. Concluding from a treatment of dulia in ST II-II, q. 103, a. 4, ad 2, Davis even writes: “It might be argued that perhaps Saint Thomas would grant even the title hyperdulia to Saint Joseph, since he does not seem to reserve it exclusively to the Blessed Virgin Mary. It is to be noted, in any case, that he includes it within dulia.”49 Davis is right to underscore that Saint Thomas understands hyperdulia as “the highest species of dulia commonly taken.”50 In ST III, q. 25, we find Saint Thomas’s reasoning for why all of the saints should be honored. On account of the Holy Spirit given to the saints due to Christ’s capital grace, the honor of the saints falls among the consequences of the Hypostatic Union. The teaching found in question 25 is clearly of interest for our argument about Saint Joseph, but before turning to that particular argument, we should consider what Saint Thomas’s Summa means by consequences of the union. Consideration of the consequences of the union leads us in turn to Saint Thomas’s preceding topic in the Summa, those things that were co-assumed in the Hypostatic Union. In a recent essay, Simon Gaine explains the Scholastic development of distinguishing the “co-assumed” and the “consequences” of the union, something which appears in Saint Albert the Great’s work.51 In his De Incarnatione, Saint Albert distinguishes the consequences between the “ends” and the “effects,” with the “ends” being Christ’s Passion and resurrection.52 According to Gaine’s analysis, Aquinas removed the “ends” from this consideration and saw the consequences of the union to be “more or less as the union’s effects.”53 48 49 50 51 52 53 Llamera, Saint Joseph, 302. Davis, Thomistic Josephology, 303. ST II-II, q. 103, a. 4, ad 2. Simon Francis Gaine, O.P., “Must an Incarnate Divine Person Enjoy the Beatific Vision?,” in Thomas Aquinas and the Crisis of Christology, ed. Roger W. Nutt, Andrew Hofer, O.P., and Michael A. Dauphinais (Ave Maria, FL: Sapientia Press, 2021), 126–38, at 136. In the Franciscan Summa Halensis, the “co-assumed” appear as defects only, but Aquinas in his treatment considers them as both perfections and defects in the qualities of the nature assumed. At 136nn30– 31, Gaine notes Alexander of Hales et al., Summa theologica III, tr. 1, q. 4, tit. 1, d. 3, and St. Albert the Great, Commentarii in III sent., d. 6. At 136n32, Gaine notes St. Albert, De Incarnatione, tr. 4, proem; tr. 6, q. 1. Gaine, “Must an Incarnate Divine Person Enjoy the Beatific Vision?,” 136. 94 Hofer and Teller Aquinas teaches the consequences of the union, “more or less as the union’s effects,” in three divisions: concerning Christ himself (ST III, qq. 16–19), concerning his relation to the Father (ST III, qq. 20–24), and concerning his relation to us (ST III, qq. 25–26). The last question, before Saint Thomas begins to treat the things that God incarnate suffered and did (ST III, qq. 27–59), is on Christ as our mediator (q. 26). Our attention is on question 25 of the tertia pars, on adoration. The effect of the Hypostatic Union for us is adoration, which we can connect with Saint Thomas’s questions on religion and its acts (including adoration in ST II-II, q. 84) and its opposed vices when treating the virtue of justice in ST II-II, qq. 81–100. Scanning the articles that comprise ST III, q. 25, we discover a descending scale of adoration emerge as effects or consequences of the Hypostatic Union. The topics of each article are as follows: Article 1: Whether the divinity and humanity of Christ are adored with the same adoration. Article. 2: Whether Christ’s flesh is adored with latria. Article 3: Whether the adoration of latria is given to Christ’s image. Article 4: Whether the adoration of latria is given to Christ’s Cross. Article 5: Whether the Mother of God is adored with latria. Article 6: Whether in no way adoration is to be given to the relics of saints. Between Saint Thomas’s reasoning in article 5 and his reasoning in article 6 lies where we find Thomistic devotion to the saints in the Summa’s pedagogy. In order to appreciate that, we need to spend more time thinking about the less-known article 6. There Saint Thomas teaches: Now it is manifest that we should show honor to the saints of God, as being members of Christ, the children and friends of God, and our intercessors. Wherefore in memory of them we ought to honor any relics of theirs in a fitting manner: principally their bodies, which were temples, and organs of the Holy Spirit dwelling and operating in them, and are destined to be likened to the body of Christ by the glory of the Resurrection. Hence God himself fittingly honors such relics by working miracles at their presence. Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 95 Saint Thomas has a remarkable theology of the saints, because all of them share in the divine life.54 His theology, and ours if we strive to be his faithful students, can be called ad mentem Dei cum sanctis.55 Notice in article 6 Saint Thomas’s keen attention to both the Son and the Holy Spirit in this consequence of the Hypostatic Union, which itself must always be seen from the work of both the Son and the Holy Spirit in the Trinity’s dispensation for our salvation. As members of Christ, the holy ones have the Holy Spirit dwelling and working in them. Our veneration of relics respects what the saints were during their lives on earth. Also, after the resurrection, they will be conformed to the body of Christ in glory. In his reply to the article’s second objection, Saint Thomas continues to show reasons for veneration of relics: on account of their souls, which now enjoy God, and on account of God, who made the saints his ministers.56 Keep in mind that this article concerning the honor shown to relics concludes a spectrum of adoration that flows from the Hypostatic Union.57 Our veneration reaches even to saints’ relics. Granted they are not given the adoration of latria, but neither is the Mother of God. The saints enjoyed the missions of the Son and the Holy Spirit through sanctifying grace, a share in Christ’s capital grace, and the bodies of the saints will be raised in glory on the last day. The point is clear: even our veneration of saints’ relics is due to the missions of the Son and the Holy Spirit that we find in the Hypostatic Union and through that union to Christ’s body, the Church, one with him. Therefore, to return to this article’s main argument, our honor of Saint 54 55 56 57 For a path-breaking study about select saints, see Innocent Smith, O.P., “St. Thomas Aquinas and the Early Christian Virgin Martyrs,” Archivum Fratrum Praedictorum, n.s. 4 (2019): 5–36. For arguments for ad mentem Dei cum sanctis as a more apt expression of Thomistic theology than ad mentem Thomae (or ad mentem patrum), see Andrew Hofer, O.P. “Conclusion: Reading Thomas Aquinas and the Greek Fathers together for the Renewal of Theology,” in Thomas Aquinas and the Greek Fathers, ed. Michael Dauphinais, Andrew Hofer, O.P., and Roger Nutt (Ave Maria, FL: Sapientia Press, 2019), 303–30, at 307–10, and “St. Thomas Aquinas on St. Benedict,” American Benedictine Review 71, no. 4 (2020): 410–34, at 417–19. ST III, q. 25, a. 6, ad 2: “We worship that insensible body, not for its own sake, but for the sake of the soul, which was once united thereto, and now enjoys God; and for God's sake, whose ministers the saints were.” For a recent discussion of a. 6, see ten Klooster, “‘Due honor to their relics,’” 3–5. For a recent study on St. Thomas with a focus on ST III, q. 25, see John Sehorn, “Worshiping the Incarnate God: Thomas Aquinas on Latria and the Icon of Christ,” in Dauphinais, Hofer, and Nutt, Thomas Aquinas and the Greek Fathers, 221–43. 96 Hofer and Teller Joseph and all the saints, even small parts of the dead bodies of the saints, comes as a consequence of the Hypostatic Union. The entire “cult of saints,” from the hyperdulia deserved by the Mother of God to our veneration of relics, is a consequence of the Hypostatic Union in a way that can remind us of how the entire life of grace flows from the co-assumed perfection of Christ’s sanctifying grace, which is the capital grace for all the saints. By locating Saint Joseph’s veneration within the adoration that is a consequence of the union for all saints, as well as locating Saint Joseph’s holiness as coming from Christ’s capital grace, which is Christ’s sanctifying grace for all, we have a great appreciation not only for Saint Joseph but for the Holy Spirit’s work of sanctification for all the saints. The mission of the Holy Spirit accompanies the mission of the Son so that creation may return to God, who has given us this oikonomia or dispensatio. The Hypostatic Union, with its missions of the Son becoming human and the Holy Spirit sanctifying humanity, gives us not only the consequence to venerate the Mother of God and Saint Joseph in unique ways, but also the reason to venerate all the saints. Before leaving the consequences of the union, we want to point to a comment made by Saint John Paul II in Redemptoris Custos. The Pope emphasizes that Saint Joseph’s fatherhood “fully shares in authentic human fatherhood and the mission of a father in the family. This is a consequence of the hypostatic union: humanity taken up into the unity of the Divine Person of the Word-Son, Jesus Christ.” The Pope continues: “Together with human nature, all that is human, and especially the family—as the first dimension of man's existence in the world—is also taken up in Christ.” Pope John Paul II concludes this thought: “Within this context, Joseph’s human fatherhood was also ‘taken up’ in the mystery of Christ’s Incarnation.”58 While not adhering strictly to the Summa’s pedagogy, Saint John Paul shows that the Word takes up what is human, and in a special way the family, by becoming flesh. Granted, this “consequence of the union” is not a matter of the consequence of adoration, but simply the structure of the eternal Son becoming man. The Son enters a human family, and in that family as husband and father is Saint Joseph. In Pope Francis’s lovely turn of phrase, Joseph loves Jesus “with a father’s heart.”59 We can honor him with a unique veneration due to the Hypostatic Union, and we should keep in mind that the veneration of all the saints is a consequence of that union. 58 59 John Paul II, Redemptoris Custos, §21 (emphasis added). See the opening of Pope Francis’s Patris Corde. Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 97 Conclusion: We have a significant concern that the focus on the “hypostatic union’s order”—pertaining to Christ’s sacred humanity, the Mother of God, and Saint Joseph—as something separate from a lower order of sanctifying grace occludes the grandeur of sanctifying grace. Such a focus separates Christ’s humanity, the Mother of God, and Saint Joseph from the Church and detracts from the unity of our salvation in Christ. Juan de Cartagena and Francisco Suárez explicitly made the Hypostatic Union’s order a different order from the order of sanctifying grace, but sanctifying grace filled Christ’s soul as what necessarily followed from the uncreated grace of union, which is the esse personale, the hypostasis of the Son assuming human nature in the womb of the Virgin Mary, betrothed to Saint Joseph. While we may rightly keep the benefits of distinctions we find in the work of such Josephologists as Llamera and Davis concerning how Saint Joseph participates in the dispensation, or economy of salvation, in the Hypostatic Union, such distinctions should be seen as ways in which Saint Joseph receives sanctifying grace in view of the Hypostatic Union. All sanctifying grace bears a set of relations to the Hypostatic Union. We see this in terms of Christ’s habitual grace, the co-assumed perfection of Christ’s soul that is the capital grace for all the saints throughout all of time, and in kinds of adoration owed as a consequence of the Hypostatic Union. Before closing, we want to consider one objection, one that was of concern to de Cartagena, Suárez, and many Thomistic theologians who follow them. How does Saint Joseph’s grace compare to the grace of the apostles, who are said to hold first place in the Church?60 According to Saint Thomas, the apostles are ranked higher than all other saints after Christ’s humanity and the Blessed Virgin Mary.61 From Aquinas’s comments on Romans 8:23, we read: To the man Christ there was given the most excellent grace, because he was chosen in order that his nature might be assumed into the 60 61 Another question could be asked about a Thomistic comparison between St. Joseph and St. John the Baptist. For St. Thomas on St. John the Baptist as a measure of spiritual greatness, see John Baptist Ku, O.P., “St. Thomas Aquinas’s Appeal to Saint John the Baptist as a Benchmark of Spiritual Greatness,” Nova et Vetera (English), forthcoming. Ku gives a close textual study, and does not address a hypothetical comparison between Joseph and John the Baptist. For Aquinas on the mission, dignity, and authority of the apostles, see ch. 2 in Jonah Mary Teller, O.P., “A Thomistic Study of the Conversion of St. Paul the Apostle” (STL thesis, Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception, Dominican House of Studies, Washington, DC, 2021). 98 Hofer and Teller unity of a divine person; and after him the Blessed Mary had the greatest plenitude of grace, because she was chosen to be the mother of Christ. Among the rest, however, the apostles were chosen for the greater dignity, namely, to receive immediately from Christ himself and to hand on to others [aliis tradere] the things that pertain to salvation. . . . And so God bestowed on them a more abundant grace in preference to the rest.62 A similar passage occurs in the Ephesians commentary, where Saint Thomas writes that it is temerarious to compare any saint to the apostles.63 Based on these comments, a reader of this article could object that Saint Thomas understands the apostles to be higher than Saint Joseph in the Church. As we saw above, the solution for de Cartagena and Suárez is to posit an order of the Hypostatic Union separate from the order of sanctifying grace. For these early modern theologians, the apostles are highest in the order of the Church’s grace, but we find Christ’s humanity, Our Lady, and Saint Joseph in an altogether different order. James Davis follows Boniface Llamera and others in continuing this idea: “St. Joseph does not belong to the ecclesiastical grades, for he is above that order, being in the order of the hypostatic union.”64 But as we have seen for Saint Thomas, even Christ’s humanity should be seen within the order of sanctifying grace. Rather than Christ’s humanity, Our Lady, and Saint Joseph being in an order separate from sanctifying grace, Christ’s humanity is so “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14) that his personal sanctifying grace is the capital grace for all, most wondrously seen in the Mother of God and, after her, Saint Joseph. The apostles are not the highest persons in the order of sanctifying grace, but they are the highest in terms of a class of saints—above martyrs and virgins, for example—due to the Holy Spirit’s sanctification at work in them in their own proximity to Christ for their authority and dignity in divine providence. Saint Thomas, like so many others before the fifteenth century, simply did not consider the ramifications of the exceptional place that Saint Joseph enjoys in providence after his spouse, the Virgin Mary, on account 62 63 64 Super Rom 8, lec. 5 (no. 678), trans. Davis, Thomistic Josephology, 105 (trans. altered); cf. Super Eph 1, lec. 3 (no. 23). Super Eph 1, lec. 3 (no. 23); trans. Davis, Thomistic Josephology, 107. Davis, Thomistic Josephology, 114. Davis concludes his comparison between Joseph and the apostles (220–31) in this way: “It seems to be most unjust to St. Thomas to say that he taught that the Apostles are the greatest in dignity or holiness immediately after Mary” (231). Reordering Thomistic Josephology: Sanctifying Grace in Christ, Saint Joseph, and Us 99 of the Hypostatic Union. Rather than thinking of Saint Joseph, Saint Thomas when forbidding the temerity of comparing a saint to the apostles, may have had in mind something that we see in a certain thirteenth-century Franciscan devotion. Some thought that Saint Francis took Lucifer’s place in heaven above other saints.65 We think that had Saint Thomas lived to see the Church’s magisterial teaching on Saint Joseph, he would have recognized Saint Joseph’s grace as even more lavish than the grace of the apostles. He certainly would not have wanted to separate Saint Joseph from the order of sanctifying grace, which is how all the saints in all times and places are united for their salvation to the Hypostatic Union of the eternal Son of God, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, Saint Joseph’s spouse. Saint Joseph’s holiness came from the Hypostatic Union’s way of communicating sanctifying grace for all the saints, and he had an extraordinarily privileged position in providence in relation to that union. That union of God and man in Christ Jesus continues through his capital grace to be an overflowing fountain of grace for us wayfarers feebly struggling towards that blest communion where the saints in glory shine.66 N&V 65 66 See The Assisi Compilation (1244–1260): “This was Lucifer’s seat, and Blessed Francis will sit on it in his place [Ista sedes fuit Luciferi, et loco eius sedebit in ea beatus Franciscus]” (franciscantradition.org/francis-of-assisi-early-documents/ the-founder/the-assisi-compilation/1259-fa-ed-2-page-168). The authors thank Basil Cole, O.P., and Reginald M. Lynch, O.P., for their assistance. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 101–131 101 Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform: A Problematization of Tradition in the Catholic Church and Catholic–Orthodox Rapprochement Tomasz Dekert Jesuit University Ignatianum in Krakow Krakow, Poland Introduction At the very center of the discord between Byzantine and Latin Christianity over the centuries have been meta-theological (including meta-dogmatic) divergences. Even if the content of the disputes and mutual accusations were and are specific articles of faith (i.e., ex patre procedit vs. ex patre filioque procedit, dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary vs. no consensus on this matter among the Church Fathers, etc.) or liturgical and disciplinary issues (leavened vs. unleavened bread, celibacy of clergy, etc.), the real problem is that the two parts of the Christian world adopt different sets of criteria as to what is to be the main and binding reference point to settle these matters.1 This can be seen most clearly in connection with the dispute over the primacy of the bishop of Rome, which lies at the intersection of theology and meta-theology and confronts dogmatic and meta-dogmatic theses, those concerning prerogatives for resolving dogmatic issues. The problem that I would like to raise in this essay is of a meta-theological nature and is related closely to the fundamental differences between Orthodoxy and Catholicism. The basis of these differences lies in the problem 1 See A. Edward Siecienski, The Papacy and the Orthodox: Sources and History of a Debate (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), ix–x. I would like to give many thanks to Dr. Laurence P. Hemming and Dr. Peter Kwasniewski for careful reading of the manuscript and numerous valuable comments, and to Dr. Ronald Ti for his help in bringing the text to the correct linguistic form. The responsibility for the theses contained in the article rests entirely with me. 102 Tomasz Dekert of tradition, the understanding of it, and its relation to the ecclesiastical authority. In a fundamental sense, the entire East–West dispute, including its meta-theological dimension, can be reduced to questions over tradition. Both the Orthodox and Western divisions of Christianity consider themselves orthodox followers of the apostolic tradition. The official and stated position of both is that the concept of tradition is a key element in their collective identity. However, they understand it differently and relate it to themselves in different ways. It would not be overstating things to say that any fruitful and lasting movement toward any reconciliation and ultimate communion has the essential pre-requisite of finding and developing a common understanding and practice of tradition. It is not the purpose of this paper to provide a definitive analysis and solution to this issue but rather to highlight a factor which, in my opinion, is infrequently discussed: that is, the problematic nature of the place and the importance of tradition in contemporary Catholicism. It is my premise that some aspects of the notion of papal authority, as they were developed within Catholic ecclesiology, have resulted historically in unintended and adverse consequences regarding the meaning of tradition and its relationship to Church authority. To put it differently, this paper will attempt to analyze and describe the current treatment by the Catholic Church (both the hierarchy and the faithful) of tradition, not as a basic premise for Christian faith and life, but as an open area of doubts, discussions, reinterpretations, and criticism, and to analyze and describe some contemporary conditions and circumstances that led to it. In my opinion, the latter are closely connected with the processes that the Catholic liturgy underwent primarily in the twentieth century.2 2 The problem of interconnections between Church authority, liturgy, and tradition in the context of liturgical reforms has already been a subject of critical considerations on the part of some Catholic authors. See especially Klaus Gamber, The Reform of the Roman Liturgy: Its Problems and Background, trans. Klaus D. Grimm (San Juan Capistrano, CA: Una Voce; Harrison, NY: Foundation for Catholic Reform, 1993), 27–39; Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Milestones: Memoirs 1927–1977, trans. Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis (San Francisco; Ignatius Press, 1998), 148; Ratzinger, The Spirit of the Liturgy, trans. John Saward (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000), 165–70.; Geoffrey Hull, The Banished Heart: Origins of Heteropraxy in the Catholic Church (London: T & T Clark, 2010); Alcuin Reid, The Organic Development of the Liturgy: The Principles of Liturgical Reform and Their Relation to the Twentieth-Century Liturgical Movement Prior to the Second Vatican Council (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2005), 306–7; Laurence P. Hemming, Worship as a Revelation: The Past, Present and Future of Catholic Liturgy (London: Burns & Oates, 2008), 27–28; Peter Kwasniewski, “Hyperpapalism and Liturgical Mutation: The Case Against the Novus Ordo,” presented Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 103 Entering the area of ​​problems related to the papal authority, tradition, liturgy, and its reform means touching on delicate issues that have been the subject of heated disputes and controversies over the last few decades. Naturally, then, the interpretation of the reform itself, the involvement of papal authority in it, and the conclusions regarding the consequences of these facts on the level of understanding and meaning of the tradition in the Church, which is offered below, will be treated—rightly so—as a voice in these disputes. I would therefore like to make it clear that the following considerations should not be understood as aimed at undermining any truth of the Catholic faith, the teaching of both of the Vatican Councils, the teaching of the pre- and post-conciliar popes, or the validity of the reformed liturgy. The problems and relationships that I am trying to describe are related to certain interpretations of the papacy, liturgy, and tradition that have gained a place, and sometimes even domination, in the Church and influenced specific decisions and practical actions. If I question something, it is precisely this domination and—apparent—obviousness of these interpretations. In this sense, my considerations are in line with reflections set out by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, who pointed out that the pope’s authority does not mean that he is superior to the tradition,3 and that the post-conciliar liturgical reform was only one of the possible applications of the Sacrosanctum Concilium, not necessarily that which implemented the provisions of the conciliar document in the most proper way.4 The essential premise for my considerations is the close relationship between the liturgy as a specific, historical ritual system functioning in the life of the Church and Catholic tradition in its objective sense (truths of the faith and their transfer) as well as its subjective sense (understanding of tradition, living according to it). The father of the Catholic liturgical movement, Dom Prosper Guéranger, described liturgy as “Tradition itself at its highest degree of power and solemnity.”5 Basing himself on, among others, Guéranger’s approach, Yves Congar developed an understanding of the liturgy as a “monument of tradition,” in which the above-mentioned relationship is described in detail. As Johan te Velde shows, for Congar 3 4 5 at the Lepanto Conference, February 16, 2019, St. Vincent Ferrer Church, Manhattan, NY, rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2019/07/hyperpapalism-andliturgical-mutation.html. Ratzinger, Spirit of the Liturgy, 165–66. Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, “Retrouver l’esprit de la liturgie: Entretien avec le Cardinal Ratzinger,” L’ homme nouveau, October 7, 2001, 9–11. Prosper Guéranger, Institutions liturgiques, vol. 1 (Paris: Société Générale de Librairie Catholique, 1878), 3. 104 Tomasz Dekert liturgy is a special and primary monument among “the monuments of tradition”6 due to the eight dimensions of their relationship he distinguished. (1) Because “tradition in its dogmatic foundation is an interpretation of Scripture continuing that of Christ and the apostles, the liturgy is truly the holy ark containing sacred tradition at its most intense.” 7 (2) In relation to the Scripture, the liturgy on the one hand “augments” it, and on the other offers its unique explanation: “The ultimate meaning of Scripture—God’s revelation in Christ, which is the aim of exegesis—is expressed most vividly in liturgy.”8 (3) By constantly renewing themselves through celebrations in a family of the faithful, liturgical practices and texts become home to a living tradition. (4) The liturgy presents its content as a lived and celebrated reality, not a theoretical instruction—tradition as passing on the mysteries of faith precedes all theological theorizing and is not limited to the transmission of texts and words. (5) Liturgy always represents the integral reality of salvation—faith is contained in the liturgy in its totality.9 (6) Liturgical language is like the language of the Scripture, rich in images and depth; it is not so much propositional or doctrinal as symbolically suggestive—its nature reflects what it carries. (7) Liturgy as a ritual has a preserving effect, and it concerns not only what is explicit or known but also what is ineffable and unfathomable, the very “mystery of faith.” (8) The liturgy is an instruction, but not in a didactic way; liturgy is not a space of argumentation or intellectual didactics, but of a living practice through which people can enter into an intimate relationship with the truths of faith.10 Although Congar’s approach to liturgy and tradition cannot be described as “conservative,” especially in the sense in which their relationship was understood by some of the pre–Vatican II Church 6 7 8 9 10 Congar distinguishes seven “testimonies of tradition”: “Holy Scripture, the oral tradition of the apostles, the magisterium’s texts, liturgy, the fathers and preachers of the church, the rules and practices of ecclesiastic life, the doctrines of theologians and human reason generally.” He divides them into “constitutive” (Scripture and apostolic tradition) and “explanatory” (the rest of them). The latter are the proper “monuments of tradition.” See Johan te Velde, “Congar on Liturgy as a Monument of Tradition,” Questions liturgiques 95, no. 3–4 (2014): 194–215, at 198. Yves Congar, La Tradition et la vie de l’Église (Paris: Fayard, 1963; repr. 1984), 106 (cited by Te Velde, “Congar on Liturgy,” 200). Te Velde, “Congar on Liturgy,” 202. See also Elizabeth Teresa Groppe, Yves Congar’s Theology of the Holy Spirit (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 30. See Te Velde, “Congar on Liturgy,” 204. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 105 hierarchy,11 and although the “traditionality” of the liturgy does not mean for him its absolute immutability, it nevertheless presupposes far-reaching stability in liturgical forms: the transmission of tradition through and in the liturgy requires continuity in the transmission of the liturgy itself in its specific shapes. Each age has its own fashions and tendencies, which, if the liturgical life of the Church were completely subjected to them, could lead to the loss of the universal character of tradition.12 The stability of the ritual, its material continuity, protects this character from decay and oblivion because it acts as “a powerful means of communion in the same reality between men separated by centuries of change and affected by very different influences,” containing and providing “elements which are much more numerous than were realized by those men who performed and preserved the rites, and actually handed them on to us: much more, even, than we ourselves can know.”13 If so, this would mean that the actual content of the liturgy is inseparable from its form and at the same time impossible to comprehensively rationally grasp at any particular historical moment.14 In this sense, the liturgy—as a specific ritual system, not the idea or concept 11 12 13 14 See Paul Philibert, “Congar’s Ecclesiastical Subtext: Intransigent Conservatism,” in Yves Congar, My Journal of the Council, trans. Mary John Ronayne and Mary Cecily Boulding, ed. Denis Minns (Hindmarsh, South Africa: ATF Theology, 2012), 48–57, at 49. Yves Congar, “Autorité, Initiative, Coresponsabilité,” La maison-Dieu 97 (1969), 34–57, at 55, as cited by Innocent Smith, “Vagaggini and Congar on the Liturgy and Theology,” Questions liturgiques 96, no. 3–4 (2015): 191–221, at 206n72: “The conservative character of the liturgy makes it possible for it to preserve and transmit intact the values whose importance one epoch may have forgotten, but which the next epoch is happy to find intact and preserved, so that it can live from them again. Where would we be if this liturgical conservatism had not resisted the late medieval taste for sensory devotions, the eighteenth century’s individualistic, rational, and moralizing imperatives, the nineteenth century’s critique, or the modern period’s subjective philosophies? Thanks to the liturgy everything has been retained and transmitted. Ah! Let us not expose ourselves to the reproach sixty years hence that we squandered and lost the sacred heritage of the Catholic communion as it is deployed in the slow flow of time. Let us keep a healthy awareness that we carry in ourselves only a moment, the tip of the iceberg in relation to a reality which is beyond us in every way.” Yves Congar, Tradition and Traditions: An Historical and a Theological Essay, trans. Michael Naseby and Thomas Rainborough (London: Burns & Oates, 1966; New York: Macmillan, 1967), as cited by Smith, “Vagaggini and Congar,” 211n98. This intuition of Congar’s corresponds closely to Hemming’s proposal in Worship as a Revelation that liturgy be understood in its various traditional rites and forms in terms of revelation—the knowledge of God which he himself gives to people in time. 106 Tomasz Dekert of the liturgy—must always be something predominantly transmitted and received, not created de novo on the basis of a certain understanding of its content, which would then lead to the construction of words, signs, and gestures that seem fitting to the artisans. As Ratzinger puts it: The “rite,” that form of celebration and prayer which has ripened in the faith and the life of the Church, is a condensed form of living tradition. . . . And thus at the same time the fellowship of generations one with another becomes something we can experience, fellowship with the people who pray before us and after us. Thus the rite is something of benefit which is given to the Church, a living form of paradosis, the handing-on of tradition.15 Following these intuitions and descriptions, I propose treating the liturgy in its specific ritual character as a synecdoche of tradition. Performing inherited, visible and, tangible liturgical forms, “more or less invariant sequences of formal acts and utterances not entirely encoded by the performers,”16 perceived and understood as solid and repetitive in time, both is intrinsically tradition and reflects it as a whole. Liturgy allows the faithful to experience durability and the truth of tradition in the face of a changing world17 and creates an objective framework for the collective and personal interpretation of the Christian “universe of meanings.” Thus, the liturgy is that part of the tradition that signifies the very tradition itself. What happens with the liturgy directly influences the way tradition as such is understood, not only in theologians’ considerations, but at the level of consciousness of participants and members of the Church. I speculate that most Orthodox would agree with Guéranger’s, Congar’s, and Ratzinger’s descriptions of the relationship between liturgy and tradition and with the general rule derived therefrom.18 At the same 15 16 17 18 Joseph Ratzinger, preface to Reid, Organic Development, 9–13, at 11. Cf. Ratzinger, The Spirit of the Liturgy, 166–67. See Roy A. Rappaport’s definition of ritual in his Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 24. See John Meyendorff, Byzantine Theology. Historical Trends and Doctrinal Themes (New York: Fordham University Press, 1987), 115. In this context, very instructive is Orthodox scholar Andrew Louth’s review of Thomas Pott’s attempt to prove that the Byzantine tradition knows cases of “inorganic” (deliberate, planned, etc.) changes in the liturgy, and that therefore the difference between the Western and Eastern approaches is actually smaller than is usually thought: “But it is not clear to me how far all this really qualifies the contrast between liturgical change in East and West. Even with Nikon’s reforms it was a matter of the modification of an existing liturgy, rather than the Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 107 time, I presume that in the Catholic world, opinions on this subject would be far from unanimous, and this approach would be rapidly opposed by a range of mutually incompatible concepts and interpretations of tradition, liturgy, and their status and relationship. I would go so far as to propose that for many (if not most) Catholics, both the concept and practice of tradition are now something distant, a category that has ceased to play an important role in self-identification. However, where it appears as a part of various Church discourses, it is problematic in many ways, and instead of being a bonding element, it becomes the subject of disputes and divisions. In my opinion, this is because of the liturgical change and the role played in it by Church authorities, especially the popes themselves. According to my understanding of the Orthodox approach to tradition, liturgy, and ecclesiastical authority,19 it seems to me that the greatly diminished 19 devising of a fresh one: there was more continuity than change. The idea of liturgy as part of tradition, as the place where we experience tradition most deeply, . . . is a fundamental perception, not peculiarly Orthodox. The truth of the Divine Liturgy—the presence of Christ, our uniting ourselves with his self-offering to the Father—is valid whatever form of words is used to express it, but that sameness is humanly grasped through particular identities. . . . The Western Church dissolved much of those particulars, but it is that perception which the Orthodox still hold to be important”; see Review of Thomas Pott, La réforme liturgique byzantine. Étude du phénomène l’ évolution non-spontanée de la liturgie byzantine (Rome: CLV Editioni Liturgiche, 2000), The Journal of Theological Studies 53, no. 1 (2002): 358–61, at 360–61. See also Lasha Tchantouridzé’s review of Pott’s Byzantine Liturgical Reform in The Canadian Journal of Orthodox Christianity 7, no. 1 (2012): 74–80. I follow such authors as: Meyendorff, Byzantine Theology; Timothy Ware, The Orthodox Church (Baltimore, MD: Penguin, 1964), 203–13; Paul Evdokimov, Orthodoxy (Hyde Park, NY: New City, 2011), 136–42; Robert Taft, “The Spirit of Eastern Christian Worship,” in Beyond East and West: Problems in Liturgical Understanding (Rome: Edizioni Orientalia Christiana, 1997), 143–60. In his later articles Taft deeply revises or even rejects some of his own theses from this text (above all, those talking about the existence of a “golden age” of the Christian liturgy, which would be continued by Orthodox worship)—see Taft, “Eastern Presuppositions and Western Liturgical Renewal,” Antiphon 5, no. 1 (2000): 10–22; Taft, “Between Progress and Nostalgia: Liturgical Reform and the Western Romance with the Christian East, Strategies and Realities,” in A Living Tradition: On the Intersection of Liturgical History and Pastoral Practice, ed. David A. Pitt, Stefanos Alexopoulos, and Christian McConnell (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2012), 19–39 (in the latter, Taft is even repentant about the dissemination of the idealized image, which he now describes as a romantic myth—see 33n36). I agree with Taft on this last point. At the same time, in my opinion, it does not invalidate his description of the “spirit of Eastern Christian worship,” especially since it is based on the views of Orthodox Christians 108 Tomasz Dekert understanding of these realities in the contemporary Catholic Church, as well as the practices based on it, is a very important obstacle to our respective congregations’ mutual understanding and communion. This obstacle is frequently overlooked. The present essay will consist of five parts: (1) a short presentation of twentieth-century changes in Catholic liturgy (especially after Vatican II) against the background of the history of the Roman rite since the reforms after the Council of Trent; (2) an attempt to articulate the theory of tradition which underpinned these changes; (3) considerations about the role of papal authority over the liturgy (in the context of its general conceptual development since the reform of Pius V) in processes of reforming it; (4) reflections on the consequences of these liturgical reforms in terms of the Catholic understanding(s) of tradition; and (5) conclusions considering one possible meaning of these consequences for a prospective Orthodox– Catholic rapprochement. The Roman Rite—A Short Recent History The history of the Roman rite during the past 450 years can be divided into two periods. The first period, from 1568/1570 to 1911—that is, from the promulgation by Pius V of the codified liturgical books (breviary and missal) to the Pius X’s reform of the Roman breviary—is a period characterized by widespread invariance of official forms of worship, guaranteed by typical texts, introduced as binding in the Catholic world particularly when it was deemed that a given local or religious rite did not possess at least a documented 200-year tradition. This obligation was meant to themselves. The main feature of this spirit is “An attachment to tradition, to the ways handed down from time immemorial by their fathers in the faith,” which “is evident in every aspect of church life in the East, but above all in worship” (Taft, “Spirit,” 148). As a side note, it is worth noting that in both of these “revisionist” texts, Taft seems to be torn between opposing tendencies: understanding the “traditionality” of liturgy in terms of deep stability of forms of worship, and fierce opposition to contemporary traditionalism. This leads him to clear inconsistencies. In “Between Progress and Nostalgia,” he sharply hits the idealizations of Tridentine (and/or Eastern) liturgy, at the same time arguing: “For Christians the only ‘ideal period of liturgy’ is the one Divine Providence has them living in” (38). Thus he actually undermines the legitimacy of liturgical reform, which he defends in an aggressive way. Of course, this is not what he meant; the statement was intended to be an argument for recognizing the current—reformed—liturgical forms as “given by Divine Providence.” Yet if he is right, reform, as a radical liturgical change, would profoundly contradict this principle. It is difficult to imagine such a change as not based on the assumption that the previous version, i.e. the one Christians had lived in up to the time of the reform, was far from the ideal. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 109 exclude the use of liturgical practices that could have been influenced by proto-Protestant (already present in the second half of the fourteenth century) and Protestant ideas.20 At the same time, it allowed the preservation of rites as divergent in character as the Ambrosian (Milanese) and Mozarabic, as well as many of the different existing Latin rites (diocesan and religious), such as the Sarum, Carthusian, Dominican, Carmelite, and so on.21 As Pius V’s bulls Quod a Nobis and Quo Primum declare, these communities could replace their rites with a codified Roman liturgy only “if they like it much more and as long as the bishop and the entire chapter are in agreement.”22 Even considering the apodictic nature of formulas ordering its adoption wherever the liturgical rite was not in such a long use, it is difficult to agree with Martin Klöckener, according to whom, “from 20 21 22 See Denis Crouan, The History and the Future of the Roman Liturgy, trans. Michael Miller (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2005), chapter 8. It seems that this regulation contained in Pius V’s bulls Quod a Nobis and Quo Primum can be read as an extension and refinement of the regulation adopted by the Council of Trent in Decree Concerning the Things to Be Observed, and to Be Avoided, in the Celebration of the Mass §7, according to which priests were obliged to use only such ceremonies and prayers “which have been approved of by the Church and have been received by a frequent and praiseworthy usage” (Dogmatic Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, Vatican Council I, Plus the Decree on the Immaculate Conception and the Syllabus of Errors [Rockford, IL: TAN, 1977], 148). In context, the conciliar decree aims at preventing superstitious approaches to the Mass rituals, which had influenced the way of performing the worship toward an arbitrary manipulation of its forms. Limiting oneself to the liturgical forms inherited and purified by long use would be a safeguard against this kind of distortion, but the same principle also holds for avoiding the problem of the manipulation of liturgical forms by the heterodox. See e.g.: Frank Senn, Christian Liturgy: Catholic and Evangelical (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1997), 489; Keith Pecklers, The Genius of the Roman Rite: The Reception and Implementation of the New Missal (London: Burnes & Oates, 2009), 20; Hull, Banished Heart, 157. See Pius V, Quod a Nobis, in Breviarium Romanum ex decreto sacrosancti Concilii Tridentinum restitutum (Paris: Johannes & Franciscus Henault, 1675) (trans. and emphasis mine). See also Pius V, Quo Primum: “This new rite alone is to be used unless approval of the practice of saying Mass differently was given at the very time of the institution and confirmation of the church by Apostolic See at least 200 years ago, or unless there has prevailed a custom of a similar kind which has been continuously followed for a period of not less than 200 years, in which most cases We in no wise rescind their above-mentioned prerogative or custom. However, if this Missal, which we have seen fit to publish, be more agreeable to these latter, We grant them permission to celebrate Mass according to its rite, provided they have the consent of their bishop or prelate or of their whole Chapter” (trans. papalencyclicals.net/pius05/p5quopri.htm; emphasis mine). 110 Tomasz Dekert then on, the lawful liturgical tradition was seen only to exist in the Roman and curial tradition.”23 Not counting the case of Pope Urban VIII’s controversial revision of the breviary hymns (1631),24 until 1911 the basis of the Roman liturgy as a whole remained essentially unchanged. Many new feasts and memorials of saints were added to it, and some corrections were made at the level of the liturgical rubrics, but these changes constituted gradual and natural developments, without interference in the structure or genius of the rites themselves. This situation replaced the pluralism that characterized earlier liturgical customs, which toward the end of the Middle Ages were vulnerable to variation and potential abuse. This liturgical chaos created opportunities to manipulate the content of the liturgy and was taken advantage of by Protestant reformers to propagate their own ideas. Also influential was the relatively fresh invention of printing, which gave great opportunities to disseminate “new” liturgical books and which contributed to a differentiation of rituals largely beyond any Church control.25 Pope Pius V, conforming to the dictates of the Council of Trent (25th session, December 4, 1563), ordered the codification of the papal liturgical books which were (in essence) very similar to their precedents certified in the fifteenth century (Ordo Missalis secundum consuetudinem Romanae Curiae printed in Milan in 1474) and the thirteenth century (the so-called Missale Regulae, a papal missal adopted and spread by Franciscans)26 —the results of the development of the papal version of the Roman rite as part of a living tradition. The changes introduced to the existing liturgical books consisted in, among others, reconciliation of the missal with the breviary, reduction of the (significant) number of prefaces and sequences, reduction of the number of feasts and votives in order to emphasize the temporal 23 24 25 26 Martin Klöckener, “Concepts of History and Tradition in Modern Liturgical Books,” in Ritual Dynamics in Jewish and Christian Contexts: Between Bible and Liturgy, ed. Claudia D. Bergmann and Benedikt Kranemann (Leiden: Brill, 2019), 85–103, at 91. On this issue see Reid, Organic Development, 47–48. See Martin Klöckener, “Liturgical Renewal through History,” Studia liturgica 44 (2014): 13–33, at 27. See: Maciej Zachara, Krótka historia Mszału Rzymskiego (Warszawa: Promic, 2014), 100; Anthony J. Chadwick, “The Roman Missal of the Council of Trent,” in T & T Clark Companion to Liturgy, ed. Alcuin Reid (London: Bloomsbury, 2016), 107–32, at 109. The fact of the close resemblance between the missal of Pius V and his predecessors is strongly emphasized in the version of the introduction to the missal of Paul VI, corrected in 1970—see General Instruction of the Roman Missal, §7, usccb.org/prayer-and-worship/the-mass/general-instruction-of-the-roman-missal/index.cfm. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 111 cycle, and so on.27 They can be compared to the pruning of shoots,28 although of course the question would be whether this codification and the manner in which it was carried out did not constitute over-pruning. In its most fundamental sense, the post-Trent reform consisted of choosing a specific—papal—traditional liturgical custom, rendering it in a codified form and then obliging the entire Latin Church to accept it at the expense of many local liturgical traditions, if those traditions did not have a sufficiently long history. The second period began in 1911, finding its apogee in the period after Vatican II and continues to this day. Its main feature is a series of escalating and accelerating changes: from Pius X and his reforms to the breviary and calendar (1911), to Pius XII’s reform of the Holy Week rites (1952–1955), to reforms during the pontificate of Paul VI (1964–1975), resulting in the exchange of all books of the Roman rite and the establishment of the Novus Ordo Missae. Pope Paul VI himself, in the apostolic constitution Missale Romanum, when promulgating the new missal, uses the following phrase to describe the structural transformations of both the core and detailed elements of the contents of the liturgical books: they “have been changed, … reviewed and considerably modified” (“mutatae . . . recognitae et valde variatae sunt”).29 So, beyond a Novus Ordo Missae, we can legitimately speak of a novus ordo liturgiae or, speaking in Klaus Gamber’s words, the “Modern Rite” instead of the “Roman Rite.”30 The most recent 27 28 29 30 They are discussed in Chadwick, “Roman Missal,” 115–17. The metaphor of “pruning” in this context is used by both Senn, Christian Liturgy, 489, and Reid, Organic Development, 41. Both the English and the Latin of Missale Romanum come from the Vatican site. See Gamber, Reform of the Roman Liturgy, 24. This terminology of Gamber’s was criticized by the Jesuit John Baldovin in Reforming the Liturgy: A Response to the Critics (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2008), especially 36–51. However, Baldovin, while pointing out various problems related to Gamber’s approach, does not deconstruct the basic thought behind this distinction, which is simply a conclusion from direct observation: the post-conciliar rite is so different from the pre–Vatican II one that if we called the latter “Roman” we must call the former otherwise. Fr. Joseph Gelineau, another Jesuit, one of the consultants of the council that implemented the reform process (the so-called Consilium ad exsequendam Constitutionem de Sacra Liturgia, or Council for the Execution of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy), made (with brutal directness) the same conclusion on which Gamber’s distinction is based: “In fact it is a different liturgy of the Mass. We must say it plainly: the Roman rite as we knew it exists no longer” (The Liturgy Today and Tomorrow, trans. Dinah Livingstone [London: Darton, Longman & Todd / Paulist, 1978], 11). Gamber’s approach could also be criticized from the perspective of historical relativism, undermining the very existence of such a thing as the “Roman Rite”—see Nathan Mitchell, “The 112 Tomasz Dekert significant act of the post-conciliar reform has been the third typical edition of the missal of Paul VI (2002). Behind all these changes there were some ideas or motivations that were clearly positive, developmental and resulting from real needs but not implying a deconstruction of the existing rite by itself. At the same time, however, their modus operandi more and more resembled the manipulation of the forms of worship, up to and including the rejection of their traditional shape in favor of elements (or even entire structures) taken from alien liturgical traditions or created entirely de novo. For example, Pope Pius X’s reform of the breviary was aimed at restoring the Roman ancient custom of reciting the entire Psalter during the week, leveling out the displacement by other feasts of the formularies of Sunday and days of liturgical periods (especially Lent), and relieving the burden on priests who found it difficult to fulfill all the obligations imposed on them. However, this was done by deep changes in liturgical calendar31 and disorganization of the Psalter—precisely the assignment of Psalms to particular days and canonical hours—contained in Pius V’s Breviarium Romanum (1568), in which “the psalmody barely differs from the oldest known evidences of the Roman office in the fifth and sixth centuries,”32 and creating a system unknown in the history of the Roman rite. Alcuin Reid writes: “It was a singular moment in liturgical history. That a pope could discard ancient liturgical Tradition by sole virtue of his own authority is found nowhere in liturgical history before Saint Pius X.”33 31 32 33 Amen Corner: Back to the Future?,” Worship 73 (1999): 60–69, at 63. If “there is no ‘Roman Rite’ and never has been,” to say that this rite has been replaced by another is simply absurd. The problem with this kind of approach is that it is paradoxically ahistorical, that is, it does not take into account that even if it is difficult to indicate the “substantial unity of the Roman Rite” in the early stages of its development, one can speak of its consolidation in the late Middle Ages, while the post–Vatican II reform, using Baldovin’s formulation, “followed centuries of relative liturgical fixity” (Reforming the Liturgy, 54). Therefore, even if one agrees with the deconstruction of “a myth of eternal liturgy” related to the Roman rite, it would be impossible to talk about the non-existence of such a rite and its long history of relative unity at the time of reform. For a thorough treatment of its unity and continuity, see Michael Fiedrowicz, The Traditional Mass: History, Form, and Theology of the Classical Roman Rite, trans. Rose Pfeifer (Brooklyn, NY: Angelico, 2020). See, e.g., Hemming, Worship as a Revelation, 125–27. See Paweł Milcarek, “Od psałterza pełnego do psałterza łatwiejszego: Z dziejów reformy Brewiarza rzymskiego w XX wieku,” Christianitas 47 (2012): 193–234, at 194. Reid, Organic Development, 77–78. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 113 Another case was the post-conciliar lectionary. The Vatican II Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium, recommended a more lavish opening of “the treasure of the Bible, . . . so that richer fare may be provided for the faithful at the table of God’s word” (§51). This goal, however, was accomplished not by widening the traditional set of pericopes, but by creating a completely new lectionary in which the existing structure of lessons and chants was changed profoundly and a completely new selection of pericopes was adopted (in two- and three-year cycles), giving up the system certified in sources included in the development line of the Roman liturgy from the seventh century.34 However, not all motivations and postulates underlying actual liturgical changes can be seen to be as positive as the ones just mentioned (putting aside the issue of their practical implementation). Since the time of Pius XII (1939–1958), in the discourse of some Catholic circles, the “political” viewpoint began to come to the fore,35 according to which the existing liturgical forms were outdated and excessively complicated 34 35 On the pre–Vatican II lectionaries see, e.g., Anscar J. Chupungco, Handbook for Liturgical Studies, vol. 3, The Eucharist (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1999), 178–81. For a critical review of the post-conciliar lectionary, see Peter Kwasniewski, “The Reform of the Lectionary,” in Liturgy in the Twenty-First Century: Contemporary Issues and Perspectives, ed. Alcuin Reid (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2016), 287–320, rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2019/05/50-years-ofreligious-and-cultural.html; see also Kwasniewski, “Not Just More Readings But Different Readings,” in Matthew Hazell, Index Lectionum: A Comparative Table of Readings for the Ordinary and Extraordinary Forms of the Roman Rite (n.p.: Lectionary Study Press, 2016), vii–xxix, rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2019/01/ not-just-more-scripture-but-different.html. Aidan Nichols calls the period after World War II a “political phase” of the liturgical movement, “when it set out to be a force on the stage of the world Church,” and when a “manifesto of popular active participation in the liturgical rite totally overshadowed mere attempts to understand and draw a spirituality from the existing Liturgy” (Looking at the Liturgy: A Critical View of Its Contemporary Form [San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1996], ch. 1). Mark Searle also points to a split within the liturgical movement: “The first [liturgical movement] focused on liturgical formation and social transformation, bringing people to the liturgy so that they might be empowered to go out and change the social order. The second focused on liturgical change and ecclesial renewal, bringing the liturgy to the people so that they might participate fully and help bring the Church into the modern world” (Called to Participate: Theological, Ritual, and Social Perspective, ed. Barbara Searle and Anne Y. Koester [Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2006], 12). His assessment of this fact seems ambivalent. On the one hand, he describes both tendencies within the liturgical movement as a “symphony”; on the other, however, he notes and emphasizes that the second dominated the first and that the essential insights which the first brought have been lost. 114 Tomasz Dekert and required more or less radical transformation. Within this branch of the liturgical movement there appeared two groups of thought. On the one hand was the academic historical approach (e.g., Joseph Jungmann’s influential “corruption theory of liturgical history”),36 and on the other hand convictions that stressed the primacy of pastoral care over liturgical tradition.37 The political perspective included such postulates and goals regarding liturgy as (for example): the elimination of repetitions accumulated over the centuries, theological corrections, restoration of “noble simplicity,” return to the sources, adaptation to the needs and mentality of modern man, making rituals more comprehensible, deferring to other Christian communities (especially Protestant), and so on. During the post-conciliar period they gained dominance and were accepted as the motivational foundation of liturgical reform through which the Roman liturgy has undergone a thorough transformation. Here are some points concerning the most important and obvious issues: 36 37 38 • While a very basic structure of the Roman Mass was maintained, there were many changes in the ordo missae (elimination of such elements as prayers at the foot of the altar, the Offertory, the Placeat, the Last Gospel; removal of obligatory use of Propers; introduction of many possible variants to celebrate a given part of the Mass); • Most of the ritual gestures of the celebrant and acolytes were abolished, including those expressing reverence toward the Body and Blood of the Lord; • Many prayers were created by experts, either de novo (e.g., newly created prayers of “Preparing Gifts” that replaced the euchology of the Offertory, as well as several new anaphoras) or based on old liturgical texts, part of which has never been in use in the history of the Roman rite (e.g., the case of the “anaphora of Hippolytus” from Apostolic Tradition as a basis of Second Eucharistic Prayer in the missal of Paul VI).38 Thomas Day, Why Catholics Can’t Sing: The Culture of Catholicism and the Triumph of Bad Taste (New York: Crossroad, 1991), 92. As Reid shows, figures like Jungmann paradoxically combined both these tendencies in their thoughts (Organic Development, 164–72). During the work on new missal, the “anaphora of Hippolytus” was thought to be the earliest preserved example of genuine Roman liturgical prayer and that is why it was used as inspiration and textual foundation of one of the newly formed anaphoras (Second Eucharistic Prayer). This is still shared by Piero Marini (as Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 39 115 • The liturgical language of Latin (in use in the Roman Church since the fourth century) was in practice all but abandoned. • The sacramental rites were completely reformulated or simply created de novo. • The church space and the way of moving in it were fundamentally changed: versus populum orientation; different altar setting, often combined with the destruction of old altars; removal of the communion rail; elimination of the visible delineation of the nave from the choir, and chancel (already long in preparation by the increasing truncation of relocation of the choir-space from the Baroque period onward), a reduced and changed system of gestures; and more.39 “the common opinion of scholars”) in his book, Challenging Reform: Realizing the Vision of Liturgical Renewal 1963–1975, ed. Mark R. Francis, John R. Page, and Keith F. Pecklers (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2007), 108. More recent historical research has called into question both the Roman provenance of the Apostolic Tradition and the belief that it reflected Roman liturgical practice in the third century. Moreover, it is quite likely that it describes a liturgy that has never actually been celebrated. See: Paul F. Bradshaw, The Search for the Origins of Christian Worship: Sources and Methods for the Study of Early Liturgy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 80–83; John F. Baldovin, “Hippolytus and the Apostolic Tradition: Recent Research and Commentary,” Theological Studies 64 (2003): 520–42; Daniel G. Van Slyke, “The Study of Early Christian Worship,” in Reid, T & T Clark Companion to Liturgy, 45–48. For detailed analysis of the techniques used by commissions of experts for creating new orations (the arbitrary alterations to ancient texts, the shifts in theological emphasis, the processes of joining two different collects—sometimes from different rites—to make an entirely new oration and so on), see Lauren Pristas, The Collects of the Roman Missals: A Comparative Study of the Sundays in Proper Seasons before and after the Second Vatican Council (London: Bloomsbury, 2013). Compare this enumeration with a more general description of John F. Baldovin, “The Twentieth Century Reform of the Liturgy: Outcomes and Prospects,” Institute of Liturgical Studies Occasional Papers 126 (2017): 1–13, at 4–5: “The implementation of the reform, under Bugnini’s tutelage and involving dozens of experts in the fields of history, theology and pastoral practice, resulted in the complete vernacularization of the liturgy, reorientation of the presiding minister vis-à-vis the assembly, an extensive and even radical reform of the order of Mass, and a major overhaul of the liturgical year, not to mention a complete revision of every sacramental liturgy and daily liturgical prayer.” It is worth noting that Baldovin is by no means an opponent of these reforms, so he is not intending to exaggerate post-conciliar changes for polemical goals. To visualize the extent of the changes from an Orthodox point of view, one can refer to Kwasniewski’s comparison: “Let us run with this thought experiment for a moment. Imagine the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom as our starting point. Now, take away 116 Tomasz Dekert The very fact of the huge scope of liturgical change is obvious to any unprejudiced observer. The real liturgy of the Catholic Church has been transformed in such a way that between the older and newer forms lies a broad border of discontinuity or rupture.40 It was (had to be) directly experienced by participants, priests, and believers, regardless of any (even the deepest and most remarkable) theological concepts that were created by the reformers’ minds, and in the light of which it appeared as in itself not making any significant change41 or as introducing substantiated or necessary changes,42 as well as whether these changes were received as positive or negative. In fact, it can be said that the experience of this discontinuity was the basic objective effect of the reform. This striking fact often escapes the attention of its defenders looking at it from a theological or historical point of view. What Was the Reformers’ Theory of Tradition? Speaking in John Baldovin’s language, the liturgical reform was “earthshaking.”43 Such rapid and radical transformations are not usually typical of tradition. The question arises, therefore, how people who were consultors and authors of all these changes understood tradition and its relationship to forms of worship. Theoretically, in the Catholic Church, it is not possible to negate the notion of tradition and its meaning. At the level of the description of the liturgy and its development, this truth is reflected in 40 41 42 43 most of the litanies; substitute a newly-composed anaphora (with only the words of consecration remaining the same); change the kontakia, prokeimena, troparia, and readings; greatly reduce the priestly prayers, incensations, and signs of reverence; and while we’re at it, hand cup and spoon to the laity, so they can tuck in like grown-ups” (“Hyperpapalism and Liturgical Mutation”). As Reid puts it, “‘rupture’ sees no difficulty in dismissing that which has been handed down and developed through the ages and starting afresh in the light of perceived contemporary needs without regard for what has gone before” (“After Sacrosanctum Concilium—Continuity or Rupture?,” in Reid, T & T Clark Companion to Liturgy, 299). I think, for example, of Paul VI’s argument in his Address to a General Audience, November, 19, 1969, where the pope announced “The Mass will be celebrated in a rather different manner from that in which we have been accustomed to celebrate it in the last four centuries,” at the same time trying to show that it should not raise any doubts, because “Nothing has been changed of the substance of our traditional Mass” (Paul VI, “The Mass Is the Same [Address of November 19, 1969],” ewtn.com/catholicism/library/mass-is-the-same-8968). See, e.g.: Baldovin, Reforming the Liturgy; Kevin W. Irwin, What We Have Done, What We Have Failed to Do: Assessing the Liturgical Reforms of Vatican II (New York: Paulist, 2013). Baldovin, “Twentieth-Century Reform,” 4. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 117 the conciliar constitution, which says that “there must be no innovations unless the good of the Church genuinely and certainly requires them; and care must be taken that any new forms adopted should in some way grow organically from forms already existing” (Sacrosanctum Concilium §23). However, the examples of radical transformation of liturgical forms cited above show that the form of worship had to be torn away from the concept of tradition or that the latter had to be reinterpreted in a way that would somehow reconcile the concept of tradition and radical liturgical change. The former was not an option, so it seems that one needs to look for answers in the latter.44 An explanation (or at least one of the possible explanations) can be found in Archbishop Annibale Bugnini, “the major architect of the liturgical reform,”45 in his reminiscence work The Reform of the Liturgy, 1948–1975. Presenting his own understanding of the meaning of the principles of “healthy tradition” and “legitimate development” as part of the liturgical reform,46 Bugnini puts them in the context of Sacrosanctum Concilium §21.47 In his interpretation of this fragment, which by comparison to it, is significantly more radical, he states that: The liturgy has two dimensions: one invisible, unchanging, and everlasting; the other, human, visible, and changeable. What is of divine institution is evidently untouchable and unchangeable. The same cannot be said of what the Church, whose action extends through time and covers the entire world, has established in order to clothe the divine elements of worship in signs and rites that will bring to light the riches and hidden meaning of the mystery.48 44 45 46 47 48 See e.g., Klöckener, “Concepts of History and Tradition,” 85–103. According to his reconstruction, the understanding of the traditional liturgy up to modern times has been based on the material continuity of visible forms, while the introduction of the reformed books (after Vatican II) was, according to the author, associated with the necessity of “a new approach toward tradition” (97). In other words, tradition ceased to be regarded as normative, but because its concept could not be abandoned, it had to be reinvented by hermeneutical actions. Baldovin, Reforming the Liturgy, 53. See Sacrosanctum Concilium, §23. See Sacrosanctum Concilium, §21: “For the liturgy is made up of immutable elements divinely instituted, and of elements subject to change. These not only may but ought to be changed with the passage of time if they have suffered from the intrusion of anything out of harmony with the inner nature of the liturgy or have become unsuited to it.” Annibale Bugnini, The Reform of the Liturgy, 1948–1975, trans. Matthew J. O’Connell (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1990), 43–44. He had expressed 118 Tomasz Dekert Further, Bugnini elaborates on the above distinction using the category of tradition. He admits that in this “visible and human” part there are elements sanctified by the ancient tradition and therefore “to some extent untouchable.” However, he immediately counteracts this statement with a rhetorical question about what, in fact, “apart from the properly theological content of the liturgy,” deserves to be called “traditional.”49 An analogous view can be found in the conciliar constitution on the liturgy, which directly separates the “rites” from their “substance,” recommending that these first should be simplified with the latter’s preservation.50 However, what is not defined is their interrelationship. This ambiguity allows the understanding of “the properly theological content of the liturgy” or its “substance” to be confined to very narrow categories, for example sacramental effectiveness. Finally, Bugnini concludes that “authentic tradition consists not in restoring what others have done, but in rediscovering the spirit that brought those things into existence, and that would do other, completely different things at other times.”51 The embodiment of tradition itself in the liturgical forms therefore in no way continues to be visible through its historical duration and continuity of particular ritual forms based on handing on (traditio), but rather through an a-historical (or even a-temporal) concept referring to some abstract, invisible, and primordial “spirit” (“properly theological content of the liturgy”), which underlies all of them, but only within an exclusively instrumental relationship: they are its tool of expression related to a given state of culture, a type of clothing that it wears to adapt to the requirements of specific times. Reaching this “spirit,” getting to know it and understand it, should, according to Bugnini, allow us to construct a liturgy that would maintain the requirement of healthy tradition and at the same time be deprived of elements that “may have come down to us as the fruit of a particular setting and a particular 49 50 51 the same view much earlier in “Why a Liturgical Reform?,” Worship 29, no. 10 (1954–1955): 562–69, especially 565: “In its essence the Liturgy partakes of the divine immutability; in outward form it shows the mark of the times.” Bugnini’s approach is broadly in line with the concepts developed by Enlightenment theologians. On the latter, see Benedikt Kranemann, “The Notion of Tradition in Liturgy,” in History and Religion: Narrating a Religious Past, ed. Bernd-Christian Otto, Susanne Rau, and Jörg Rübke (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2015), 333–53, at 340. See Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 44. See Sacrosanctum Concilium, §50. Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 44. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 119 occasion and which may no longer be, or be only with difficulty, visible witnesses to the reign of grace.”52 So it turns out that what is really traditional in the liturgy is invisible. Bugnini agrees that the invisible is immutable—that is his reinterpretation of the immutability of tradition. The effect of this procedure is paradoxical: the “traditionality” of the liturgy is elevated by transferring it to the level of the idea, accessible only to intellectual cognition/discovery and purified of all historical and cultural “sediments,” while at the same time this immutability becomes obviously banal: what is invisible and untouchable simply cannot be changed. In the radical logic of this approach, any rite can be regarded as “traditional,” including one that is invented and composed from the beginning to the end without any connection or reference to earlier liturgical forms, but which in the minds and intentions of its creators and promoters will be considered as containing and/or giving the “properly theological content of the liturgy,” or its “spirit.” From the point of view of this theoretical construction, people who would be predestined to discover and understand this spirit and clothe it in appropriate semiotic structures become a necessary element not only of liturgy reform but of the liturgical life of the Church in general. As Bugnini writes: “‘To rediscover the spirit’: this requires research and review; a scrupulously careful and diligent determination of what makes up the sacred patrimony so that the valid appraisal may emerge objectively and, as it were, naturally and spontaneously from study, meditation, and prayer.”53 “Research and review” can be carried out only by specialists, those who are competent to do them. The enumeration of adverbs—“objectively, naturally, spontaneously”— is just asking to have “organically” added to it. In fact, it seems that Bugnini proposes here a special kind of concept of “organic development of the liturgy,” which is to be free from the weakness associated with the not fully controlled and centuries-old process of shaping and establishing liturgical rites, which tends (according to him) to a fixation on their particular historical forms. In his version, it should rely on a scientific-and-prayerful research and evaluation process carried out by specialists. As a result, “a properly theological content of the liturgy” is to emerge in their minds “objectively, naturally, and spontaneously,” which, thanks to “the effort to make the rites speak the language of our own time,”54 will provide contemporary people with rites that will be truly traditional and at the same time understandable, flexible, 52 53 54 Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 45. Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 44. Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 45. 120 Tomasz Dekert and adaptable. On this reading, “organic” would name the quality of the mental process of a selected group of experts and its effect. In the light of the above analysis of Bugnini’s approach, we can see what theory of tradition served as the basis for understanding the relationship of tradition and liturgy in such a way that it allowed their material and visible continuity to be broken, while maintaining a nominal reference to the concept of tradition and traditionality.55 In this approach, there is no room for the thought that it is the overall modus of worship, as the product of the specific, historical prayer tradition of the Church that constitutes the fundamental environment of faith and proper communion with God. Tradition understood as an integral heritage, not only doctrinal in the 55 The question remains how popular this thinking was among other reformers. The matter is certainly complex and difficult to sum up clearly. Looking at, for example, the thought of such outstanding and significant authors for liturgical reform as Cipriano Vagaggini, O.S.B., one can see that, on the one hand, he understands the tradition of liturgy in terms of being “strongly anchored to the past, precisely to make the present generations live in connection with the past ones” (Il senso theologico della liturgia: Saggio di liturgia theologica generale, 4th ed. [Roma: Edizioni Paoline, 1965], 797 [translation mine]), while on the other hand, this does not prevent him from using rationalist criteria in assessing such deeply traditional elements of the liturgy as the Roman Canon. An approach that assesses a text so ancient and complex with overlapping successive layers according to criteria of structural simplicity and clarity, logical and natural continuity of thought, lack of repetition, and the quality and proportions of the theology it contains (cf. idem, Il canone della Messa e la riforma liturgica [Torino: Elle Dici, 1966], 71) imposes foreign rules on the investigated text and must necessarily lead to it being considered full of defects—see Bartłomiej Matczak, Cipriano Vagaggini OSB i reforma liturgiczna. Studium na podstawie zbiorów archiwów w Camaldoli (Kraków: Wydawnictwo Benedyktynów Tyniec, 2013), 200–12. More importantly, however, it shows that the paradigm adopted by Vagaggini allowed or perhaps compelled him to approach the par excellence traditional text (created as a result of gradual cumulative development, which was in very long and constant use and was supported by the authority of the Council of Trent [see Doctrina et canones de sanctissimo missae sacrificio, §4]) as something that can and should be improved basing on the rational judgment of a single specialist (or the opinion of a group of specialists) and defects and needs noticed by him (them). Discussions concerning Eucharistic prayers and proposed changes in the Roman Canon by other authors (e.g., Küng or Amon, whom Vagaggini critically engages—see Matczak, Cipriano Vagaggini, 216–17) show that it was a universal approach. To be precise, Vagaggini himself believed that the “defects” of the Roman Canon he identified nevertheless do not allow us thoroughly to rebuild it, among other reasons because of its deep connection with the tradition of the Roman liturgy. Therefore, he proposed leaving the Canon unchanged, but also creating a new one that would be free from the defects of that old (Matczak, Cipriano Vaggagini, 217). Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 121 sense of established dogmatic formulas, conciliar decisions, and so on but fundamentally, as an inherited ritual way of sharing in the sacrifice that the Son gives to the Father in the Holy Spirit, is not treated here as a significant defining element of the lex credendi, let alone as a norm for its own development. Papal Authority in Liturgical Reform The new liturgy as a product of a team of scholars and their understanding of tradition would not be able, by itself or on the basis of the authority of its creators, to supplant the liturgical practice, even taking into account existing abuses, the widespread legal (non-theological) approach to worship, and many other real problems faced by pre-conciliar Catholic liturgical life. However, coming after the Council of Trent, which in fact set a precedent in this matter, it was the pope who was to introduce the post–Vatican II reforms. They were unanimously understood as a papal enterprise, making use of the pope’s authority, and imposing the obligation to receive a “renewed” liturgy on the whole of the Latin Church. Pope Paul VI himself may not have fully shared Bugnini’s (and others reformers’) rationalist conception of tradition, but some of its elements, as well as openness to constructivism and archeologism, were included in the conciliar constitution itself56 and served to legitimize the hermeneutics of the real nature and scope of changes introduced to the Catholic liturgy. The constitution Missale Romanum presents the reforms of Paul VI as a parallel to or congruent with the principles of the reforms after the Council of Trent. These were preceded by a commission appointed by Saint Pius V for the review of old liturgical codices and works of Christian writers which, as said in the bull Quo Primum, allowed the pope “to restore the Missal to the pristine form and rite of holy fathers” (“ad pristinam Missale ipsum sanctorum Patrum normam ac ritum restituerunt”). On the other hand, in Paul VI’s text this is described as merely the first stage of a process that today can be developed further, because (in terms of Paul VI’s perspective) the “oldest liturgical sources” had been discovered since then, the “liturgical formulas of the Eastern Church” were newly analyzed, and “liturgical disciplines” were further developed. In other words, the constitution Missale Romanum seems to imply that, if in the time of Pius V, early and Eastern liturgical sources had been available, and if analytical tools had been as developed as in our own times, the post-Trent Mass might 56 See Th. Kocik, “The ‘Reform of the Reform’ in Broad Context: Re-Engaging the Living Tradition,” Usus Antiquior. A Journal Dedicated to the Sacred Liturgy 3, no. 2 (2012): 102–14, at 109. 122 Tomasz Dekert well have been returned to a form that resembled the Mass in, for example, second-century Rome. At no point, however, is it specified precisely on what basis and by what criteria the achievements of historical science, new source discoveries, or the awareness of the body of Eastern liturgical traditions would or should be used in the reform of the liturgy of the Roman rite in its concrete givenness. It is also apparent that these criteria were somewhat diverse, selective, and arbitrary, and tended not to treat the traditional form of the liturgy as an essential premise for “renewed” forms. The official description of the understanding of tradition in the post-conciliar reform is contained in the introduction (proemium) to the General Instruction of the Roman Missal (§6–9), added to this document in the 1970 edition.57 Its addition was caused by criticism directed at its content as promulgated on April 3, 1969,58 and was intended to ensure that the new missal would be impeccable in terms of the rules of faith and tradition. Looking at this introduction and its identification of tradition in the light of the earlier analysis of Bugnini’s views, one can notice the closeness of these approaches. It anchors the “traditionality” of the liturgy in Sacrosanctum Concilium §50’s repetition of Pius V’s order that rites be restored “to the original norms of the holy fathers” (“from the fact that the same words are used, it can be noted how the two Roman Missals, although four centuries have intervened, embrace one and the same tradition”),59 but further states that today we must understand this rule differently: Hence, the “norm of the holy Fathers” requires not only the preservation of what our immediate forebears have handed on to us, but also an understanding and a more profound pondering of the Church’s entire past ages and of all the ways in which her one faith has been expressed in forms of human and social culture so greatly differing among themselves, indeed, as those prevailing in the Semitic, Greek, and Latin regions. Moreover, this broader view allows us to see how the Holy Spirit endows the People of God with a marvelous fidelity in preserving the unalterable deposit of faith, even though there is a very great variety of prayers and rites.60 57 58 59 60 The first editio typica of 1969 does not contain this introduction—see Maurizio Barba, Institutio Generalis Missali Romani: Textus, Synopsis, Variationes (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2006), 390–408. Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 287. General Instruction of the Roman Missal, §6. General Instruction of the Roman Missal, §9. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 123 Given that this is a fragment of the introduction to the liturgical book very different from its predecessor, the words “not only the preservation of what our immediate forebears have handed on to us” (my emphasis) can be considered a largely rhetorical procedure. According to this document, reaching true tradition is about understanding how “the one faith” has been expressed in history in different languages and cultures. It is nothing else but Bugnini’s search for “the spirit that brought those things into existence, and that would do other, completely different things at other times.”61 Establishing this has become and continues to be possible thanks to “innumerable writings of scholars,” scientific research on early Christian liturgy and the Fathers of the Church. Therefore, the “tradition/ traditionality” of the liturgy is primarily determined by what specialists will extract from its history (in the broadest sense). It can be said that the understanding of the concept of tradition in terms of material continuity is replaced here by history, understood as a reservoir of elements that can be used in the construction of rituals adapted to the dynamically changing “needs of our time” according to the rules abstracted through the analysis of different cultural and linguistic expressions of “the one faith.” As Klöckener sums up this reinterpretation of tradition: “This theological concept of tradition and reform makes history indispensable for the future revisions of liturgical books in the Catholic Church. Crucial is, however, that the church should never stick to a certain period of history and its tradition.”62 It is at this point that the fundamental difference between the reforms of Pius V and Paul VI can be summarized. The reforms of Pius V consisted in codifying the existing custom certified both by known practiced rites and by quantified sources, and then in mandating that it be accepted wherever a given local rite was younger than two hundred years. On the other hand, the reforms of Paul VI consisted, in varying degrees, of first breaking down the existing custom into its prime factors—with sharp reduction of some of its parts and multiplications of others—then both mixing and textually revising existing euchology, adding to both euchology and 61 62 Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 44. Klöckener, “Concepts of History and Tradition,” 98–99. A similar concept seems to be propounded by Taft when he writes that “the Latin Catholic West does not need to return nostalgically to a dead and gone-forever medieval or Tridentine past,” while recommending reaching for the riches of the whole Western tradition, especially these rediscovered by twentieth-century ressourcement (“Between Progress and Nostalgia,” 37–39). Due to the constricted understanding of tradition in terms of material continuity, this means reaching into the reservoir of history available through the work of experts. 124 Tomasz Dekert the ordo elements which were new or came from other liturgical sources (sometimes sources which had never previously been in use within the framework of the Roman rite), and so on, and then requiring compliance with these changes, mandating use of new liturgical books in the entire Church, combined with, in essence, the complete prohibition of traditional and ancient practice and texts.63 Hence in terms of the approach to real, visible, and tangible liturgical tradition, the two reforms, separated by a period of four hundred years, were fundamentally different.64 However, they had one common denominator in that each established a new precedent in Church history regarding acts of papal authority. This consisted of 63 64 See e.g., Alcuin Reid, “The Usus Antiquior—Its History and Importance after The Second Vatican Council,” in T & T Clark Companion to Liturgy, 455–82. The post-conciliar reform caused a long and stormy discussion on the question whether promulgating new liturgical forms was tantamount to abrogating the old ones and whether the latter could be banned. The consensus of the committee of cardinals appointed by Pope John Paul II in 1986 to resolve this case, and above all Benedict XVI’s motu proprio Summorum Pontificum and the accompanying papal letter to the bishops, deny that the old liturgy was abrogated or banned. However, this did not end the disputes (in fact Summorum Pontificum intensified them rather), and some Catholic scholars and canonists criticize these settlements. See: Baldovin, Reforming the Liturgy, 130–33; Chad J. Glendinning, “Was the 1962 Missale Romanum Abrogated? A Canonical Analysis in the Light of Summorum Pontificum,” Worship 85, no. 1 (2011): 15–37; Andrea Grillo, Beyond Pius V: Conflicting Interpretations of the Liturgical Reform (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2013), 94–118; Francis L. Agnoli, “An Overview of Summorum Pontificum and Its Accompanying Documents,” in The Liturgy Documents, vol. 4, Supplemental Documents for Parish Worship, Devotions, Formation, and Catechesis (Chicago, IL: Liturgy Training Publications, 2013), 632–60, at 635–36. Nathan Mitchell, in discussion with Ratzinger, attempts to polemically reverse the proportions of “non-traditionality” of both reforms, writing that “the liturgical reforms prompted by the Council of Trent were far more drastic, unprecedented, and untraditional than those which followed Vatican II” (“The Amen Corner: Rereading Reform,” Worship 71, no. 5 (1997): 453–66, at 465). Although he rightly emphasizes the general innovation of the post-Trent reform from the perspective of customary Western liturgical pluralism, he omits two very important facts: (1) leaving intact traditional diocesan and religious rites at least two hundred years old, and requiring the consent of the bishop or the entire chapter if communities celebrating them would like to switch over to the Roman rite; (2) the codified Roman rite, because of the emphasis on the material continuity of ritual forms, remained in a far-reaching similarity to the vast majority of liturgical customs of the time—it was not a rupture itself and did not cause the experience of rupture. As Reid puts it: “Neither clergy nor laymen were astounded by this reform” (Organic Development, 44); see also Fiedrowicz, Traditional Mass, for many examples of continuity long before and long after Trent. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 125 the exercise by the pope of the right to decide on the prescribed forms of liturgy (with the difference outlined above) as well as the right, by papal decree, to dictate the abandonment of current liturgical practices in favor of those established by a papal fiat.65 There remains the question of whether there is in fact a continuum between Saint Pius V and the popes of the twentieth century, starting with Saint Pius X, whose reform of the breviary disturbed the continuity of forms and set a precedent in accepting non-liturgical criteria as justification for liturgical changes. According to Geoffrey Hull, this continuum exists and manifests itself in various forms: “top-down” (e.g., the appointment of the Congregation of Rites and Ceremonies by Sixtus V in 1588) and at a “grassroots” level (e.g., the relinquishment, by some religious orders, of their own rites in exchange for the codified papal liturgy, the activity of Guéranger in favor of the acceptance of the Roman Missal by all French dioceses during the mid-nineteenth century, etc.), aimed at ever deeper centralization and unification of the Catholic liturgy.66 During this period there were changes in how the rights of popes were understood (both by the popes themselves and by the rest of the Church), such that rejection of the traditional form of worship based on papal authority— which in the times of Pius V and later popes was inconceivable—became possible. As Hull puts it, “greater central control . . . would later be the 65 66 One could argue that this analogy is illusory, because the conciliar constitution, by allowing various adaptations and giving the right to approve or reject them “to various kinds of competent territorial bodies of bishops” (Sacrosanctum Concilium, §22), as Vagaggini put it a few days after it was adopted by the Council, “sanctions the foundation of a decentralization in the area of liturgy” (“I principi generali della riforma liturgica approvati dal Concilio,” L’osservatore Romano, Dec. 9, 1963; English trans. at “Father Vagaggini’s Article on Liturgy Document,” vaticaniiat50.wordpress.com/2012/12/10/father-vagagginis-article-on-liturgy-document/). In reality, however, this “decentralization”—as later events showed—concerned only some details of the liturgy already reformed at the central level. The liturgical “freedom” in the post-conciliar period was paradoxical: the whole Church was obliged to adopt reformed rites that could then be adapted to specific conditions (e.g., translated into national languages) and modified to some extent, although Rome’s approval was still required. In turn, the opportunity to participate in old liturgical forms was practically abolished and banned in an authoritarian way, in a vivid style reminiscent of overbearing phrases from Quo Primum—yet with the difference that, compared to the implementation of the post-Trent reform, the one after Vatican II was carried out much more quickly and much more radically. In this sense, decentralization in the liturgy was largely apparent, not real. See Hull, Banished Heart, 156–87. 126 Tomasz Dekert principal channel of liturgical subversion in the pontificate of Paul VI.”67 The history of the resistance of some Catholics to the liturgical reform of Paul VI and Rome’s reaction demonstrate that, because of the fact that a new liturgy had been introduced by the pope’s act of will, the attachment to inherited forms and the desire to participate in them by some in the body of the Church have consequently been seen by many decision-makers as adverse, attacking the unity of the Church, and undermining papal authority.68 In essence, these “divergent” opinions have become something to be suspicious of and considered harmful, which must consequently be resisted with all severity. And yet we are talking not about some heretical whims, but about opposition to the rejection of a liturgy which for four hundred years was at the core of the Church’s life, and whose fundamental shape had been established within the living tradition long before Pius V ordered its codification. The second plane on which one can see the continuity and a kind of logical connection between the reforms of Pius V and Paul VI is the problematic relationship between tradition and liturgical forms. The postTrent reform, by codifying the existing traditional rite, by putting it in typical books and by then imposing this on the whole Church (though with known exceptions, and, as in the case of Catholic France, not in an absolutely rigorous way69), has limited and effectively halted its development and supplanted a large part of its various local versions. In this sense, the living local liturgical traditions have effectively been gradually replaced with a traditional but strongly unified and centrally controlled system of worship adopted in accordance with the authority of the pope. This was a necessary process to some extent, due to the chaos mentioned above and the threat of Protestant influence. At the same time, however, it led to the liturgical alienation of the faithful and the loss of the liturgy’s role as a carrier of living tradition70 in favor of liturgical tradition understood mainly in juridical terms as “official forms of church worship,” 71 in 67 68 69 70 71 Hull, Banished Heart, 173. See Reid, “Usus Antiquior,” 460. Most of the French dioceses did not accept the post-Trent reform and this situation lasted until the second half of the nineteenth century. And then their change to the Tridentine rite did not happen at the initiative of the popes. See Hull, The Banished Heart, 171: “Popes Gregory XVI and Pius IX were both favourable to the spread of the modern Roman liturgy in France but they considered this a desideratum rather than a real necessity, and they were moreover reluctant to force a change that would be resented by the majority of French Catholics.” See: Gamber, Reform of the Roman Liturgy, 16; Taft, “Spirit,” 148–49. Louis Bouyer, Life and Liturgy (London: Sheed & Ward, 1956), 1 (cited in Hull, Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 127 which “traditionality” was guaranteed by papal authority. This thinking is reflected in the words of Bugnini when referring to a letter from a group of French clergy sent to Paul VI in protest against the imposition of a new Mass, which they perceived as “Protestant”: This letter is an obvious rejection of ecclesiastical authority. The question is often asked how devout persons, attached to tradition, could maintain that an apostolical constitution, one of the most solemn of papal documents and one that comes close to involving papal infallibility, could sponsor or even impose a liturgical book not in conformity with Church doctrine.72 It is clear that, in his view, “an attachment to tradition” should, in and of itself, lead all those offended by the liturgical changes to the conviction that, if they were introduced by the pope, they are certainly consistent with tradition, even against all reasoning and experience.73 The Consequences for Catholic Understanding of Tradition The actions of the twentieth-century popes (especially Pius X, Pius XII, and Paul VI) indicate that, in this period, the concept of papal authority over the liturgical tradition has passed to a more or less absolutist level: the will of the pope overrules all preceding tradition and in fact can be seen as creative of tradition as such. Until the post-conciliar times, the popes’ practical influence on the level of collective understanding of tradition was relatively small. With few exceptions, breviary reform affected only the clergy and religious. As a matter of fact, some of them (primarily from religious 72 73 Banished Heart, 162). Bouyer found this definition in one of the then used handbooks of liturgy. Bugnini, Reform of the Liturgy, 290. This type of argument, expressing rhetorical surprise that anyone could possibly have any doubts about or difficulties with the reform when such great authorities are behind it seems to be one of Bugnini’s main polemical strategies. See, e.g., Bugnini, “The Consilium and Liturgical Reform,” The Furrow 19, no. 3 (1968): 177–79, at 177: “I will spare you the details of the negative reactions the Instruction [he means Tres Abhinc Annos] occasioned—the hidden doctrinal ‘tendencies,’ the theological and pastoral errors, the democratization, the vandalism, and so on. None of this has any basis of truth. How can people suspect us of extremist tendencies in a document which has passed the scrutiny of hundreds of experts and of the Church’s hierarchy?” In this context, it is significant to mention Vagaggini’s statement that the approval of the rites by the pope, even within the ordinary magisterium, means that “these liturgies can be considered in practice as immune from errors against faith and morals” (Il senso teologico, 489; [translation mine]). 128 Tomasz Dekert orders) expressed strong reservations because it imposed a new Psalter and calendar, as well as changes to those orders that had their own office.74 What the faithful could experience for themselves were the changes in the calendar.75 In turn, although the reforms of Pius XII concerned the most important period of the year (Holy Week and Pentecost), as a consequence of the generally low level of interest and engagement with the Triduum Sacrum (as well as with the Pentecost Vigil) amongst the faithful,76 these changes passed largely unnoticed. Hence, however deep, they did not generate the effect of a collapse of the significance of tradition. In stark contrast were the reforms of Paul VI, which altered the entire liturgy of the Roman rite and introduced mandatory and binding non-traditional forms of worship. In this context, assertions that the conciliar vision not only of the liturgy but also of the Church departed from the earlier ultramontane character of the period after the French Revolution take on a slightly different, ironic sense.77 Looking at the nature of the reform, it is possible to reach exactly the opposite interpretation, namely, that it is in the liturgical reform and the attempt to create a “new Church”—making full use, after all, of the power of papal authority—that this ultramontane culture and its anti-traditional potential have reached their peak. William D. Dinges, analyzing the sociological background of the so-called post–Vatican II “worship wars,” noticed that liturgical reform left many Catholics with the impression that what had been viewed as heaven-sent and absolute in form and structure was permeable and subject to redefinition and territorial variation. Changes in Catholicism’s core corporate ritual also awakened the troubling possibility that other constitutive elements of the Church were not an objective given, but that they, too, had been (and could be) sociologically and historically constructed and reconstructed.78 74 75 76 77 78 See, e.g., William Bonniwell, A History of the Dominican Liturgy (New York: Joseph F. Wagner, 1944), 347–58. See Hemming, Worship as a Revelation, 126–27. Changing this situation was one of the main purposes of Pius XII’s reform. The results, however, were uneven and four years after the introduction of the reformed Easter Vigil, the participation of the faithful was still not as numerous as had been expected (Reid, Organic Development, 222). E.g., Massimo Faggioli, True Reform: Liturgy and Ecclesiology in Sacrosanctum Concilium (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2012), 53. William D. Dinges, “Ritual Conflict as Social Conflict: Liturgical Reform in the Roman Catholic Church,” Sociological Analysys 48, no. 2 (1987): 138–57, at 142–43. See also Uwe Michael Lang, Signs of the Holy One: Liturgy, Ritual, and Expression of the Sacred (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2015), 151. Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 129 This sociological description of the disintegrative consequences of liturgical change on the traditionality of Catholicism can, in my opinion, be amplified by pointing out two key implications of linking these reforms with papal authority. If the liturgy is a synecdoche of tradition, the act of reform and the essentially mandatory introduction of new, non-traditional forms of worship was a clear statement of absolute papal authority over the liturgy, and therefore also over tradition itself. In my opinion, this statement had two key implications: 79 • If concrete, visible, inherited ritual forms are no longer a basic binding premise for the further development of the rite, then power (above all Rome’s) is the only reference point and regulator: primarily in terms of the liturgy as such, but also over every other form of tradition (doctrine, discipline, the Christian way of life, etc.); • If the pope can introduce new, non-traditional forms of worship solely on the grounds that he has the authority to do so, it means that the entire content of tradition is able to be modified according to a single “volitional” power exercised by a single individual.79 This created consequences regarding the fundamental understanding of the basis of papal authority that, in fact, were adverse and, somewhat paradoxically, undermined it. By introducing non-traditional forms of worship and prohibiting the former ones (effectively a denial of the authority of tradition), the pope and other bishops diminished and, ultimately, undermined their own authority. Such authority without the foundation of tradition is, for all practical intents, baseless. So by their actions, these popes opened the way not only to the denial of particular ritual forms and the wider content of tradition, but also to a denial of their own ability and right to counteract errors among the faithful by demanding their According to Hemming, the prior and deeper foundation of this shift was the rationalist objectification of the liturgy, its transfer to the sphere of the ideas of human reason, whose real liturgy is to be only a representation: “It could quite properly be argued that these changes were only possible because the direction in which they were driven had, in a sense, as changes already occurred in the minds of the experts and theologians who recommended them. The objectification of the sacred species of the Eucharist has been traced, with degrees of success, by Henri Cardinal de Lubac in his fundamental work Corpus Mysticum; the alterations to the Breviary exhibited, as László Dobszay and others have argued, an objectification of the liturgy as a whole—as something subject to papal fiat” (Worship as a Revelation, 143). 130 Tomasz Dekert obedience. Surely obedience to authority is nonsensical if that same authority no longer has a legitimate basis. Even Matthew 16:18 and Vatican I’s interpretation of it, for example, depend on the preceding Catholic tradition of interpretation; it is not by papal fiat that popes have their legitimate authority, but by the will of Christ as perceived and transmitted in the maternal memory of the Church. The same Spirit that maintains integrity of doctrine and hierarchical charisms also maintains the integrity and orthodoxy, as well as the authority, of liturgical tradition. To deny assistance in one these areas is to deny it in the others. The influence of both of these implications has been reflected in a certain basic polarization of positions in the post-conciliar Church. Broadly described, one point of view is a “conservative” emphasis on— more or less—blind obedience to ecclesiastical authorities (especially to the pope), regardless of whether their words or actions are actually in accordance with the Church’s tradition (even as codified in earlier papal and conciliar documents); the other point of view is the “liberal” rejection of both tradition and obedience: essentially taking power in one’s own hands, arbitrarily deciding on issues of faith and morals. These attitudes appear to represent contrary positions, but in fact they represent two aspects of the same issue, which is the crisis of tradition. Tradition itself ceased being a central norm or standard to which we could turn to look for tools to assess potential developments in the liturgy, the proper understanding of dogmas, indications for moral choices, and so on. It is clear that these represent two extremes of opinion. In between these polarities, there is a diversity of opinion, both individual and collective; for sure there are also people and entire groups (e.g., some religious communities) which to some extent break out of this dialectic. But it is clear to me that present-day Catholic identity and everyday practice of faith has been deeply affected on all levels—from personal to organizational—by these trends. Conclusion In conclusion, the question arises about the effect of this situation on the potential for the reestablishment of full communion between the Orthodox and Catholic churches. This strikes me as being a significant and problematic issue. One factor in this is that the pope’s authority and control over liturgy and tradition, sanctioned in the Western Catholic Church by liturgical reforms, is not only a foreign concept, but even profoundly inappropriate to the Orthodox. The problem is more entrenched in the Catholic mainstream, because under the influence of the trends discussed Tradition, the Pope, and Liturgical Reform 131 above, there is very little to no understanding of the importance of tradition as an integral legacy to be continued and implemented at all levels of Christian life. Hence this is a meta-theological situation that goes beyond divergences at the theological level. The Roman church has undergone a profound transformation resulting—by means of the liturgical reform—in the ultimate primacy of power over tradition. This transformation has subsequently affected the key meta-theological dimension, a critical determinant upon the success of future dialogue and rapprochement. In my opinion, until Catholicism rediscovers its identity as tradition-constituted and returns to the concept of power as being subordinate to tradition, all efforts to return to full communion with the Eastern Church will be N&V unlikely to make significant progress. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 133–157 133 Neither Subtraction, Nor Addition: The Word’s Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature James E. Dolezal Cairn University Langhorne, PA Christological Challenge to Classical Theism Classical Christian theists are unflinching in their insistence that the divine Word suffered no change in his assumption of a human nature. Augustine of Hippo says the only Son is “the Maker of all things, unchangeable with the Father, unchanged by the assuming of human form, man by incarnation, the Son of man, and the Son of God.”1 Cyril of Alexandria states, “The Word was made man as we are, but was not changed.”2 John of Damascus holds that the “Person of the Word of God became Person to the flesh, and in this way ‘the Word was made flesh,’ and that without any change.”3 Thomas Aquinas concurs, stating, “The Word, of course, is entirely immutable.”4 In assuming our nature, “no change was made in the Word of God Himself, but only in the human nature which was assumed by the Word, in accord with which it is proper that the Word was both temporally generated and born, but to the 1 2 3 4 St. Augustine, In Iohannis evangelium tractatus, tract. 46, no. 3, in St. Augustine: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers ser. 1, vol. 7, ed. Philip Schaff (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1986; originally 1888). St. Cyril of Alexandria, On the Unity of Christ, trans. John Anthony McGuckin (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1995), 92. John of Damascus, De fide orthodoxa 3.11, in Saint John of Damascus: Writings, trans. Frederic H. Chase, Jr. (New York: Fathers of the Church 1958). Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles [SCG] IV, ch. 37, no. 1, in Aquinas, On the Truth of the Catholic Faith, trans. Anton C. Pegis, James F. Anderson, Vernon J. Bourke, and Charles J. O’Neil, 5 vols. (Garden City: Doubleday, 1955). 134 James E. Dolezal Word Himself this was not fitting.”5 This insistence that the Word was made man without undergoing any change in himself is most agreeable to the core claims of classical theism, including divine pure actuality, simplicity, impassibility, and timelessness. Several critics of classical theism allege that its core claims about the divine being cannot be squared with the reality of the divine Word’s Incarnation. In order to become flesh (John 1:14), to take the form of a servant (Phil 2:7), and to become poor (2 Cor 8:9), the Word must undergo some sort of real alteration and movement from his pre-incarnate state. Corresponding to this change must also be some newness of being in God. Classical theism, with its denial of all such movement, seems to proscribe any possibility of a real Incarnation. The Jesuit theologian Jean Galot, for instance, insists that “the mutability of the Incarnation” cannot be a change located solely in the assumed human nature, as classical theologians had almost universally claimed, but that “the newness lies first of all in the realm of the divine, before affecting the human nature of Jesus.” God’s dynamic activity in the Incarnation “demands an authentic innovation in God himself.”6 Galot calls for a relaxation of the demands of immutability in order to accommodate innovation of being in God. Other critics are more overt in their challenges to classical theism in light of the Word’s assumption of a human nature. R. T. Mullins, for example, insists that divine simplicity is “in direct conflict with any adequate Christology.” 7 Presumably this is because divine simplicity is rooted in pure actuality, and pure act will not allow the mutation that is claimed to be requisite for the Word to become flesh. Mullins draws the same conclusion respecting divine timelessness. He correctly points out that undergoing any sort of change would be sufficient to show a thing to be temporal. And, he notes, “The incarnation seems to be a clear example of God the Son undergoing a change, and thus being temporal.”8 Mullins judges that divine atemporality is repugnant to Christian belief since “a timeless God cannot become incarnate.”9 Given such allegations, one might reasonably wonder how so many classical Christian theists down the ages could have failed to see that their 5 6 7 8 9 Aquinas, SCG IV, ch. 49, no. 3. Jean Galot, S.J., Who Is Christ? A Theology of the Incarnation (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1981), 270. R. T. Mullins, “Simply Impossible: A Case against Divine Simplicity,” Journal of Reformed Theology 7 (2013): 201. R. T. Mullins, The End of the Timeless God (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 157. Mullins, End of the Timeless God, 189. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 135 doctrine of God was patently incompatible with such a central Christian mystery as the Incarnation of the Word. But perhaps, as I will argue, classical Christian theists had a different understanding of the Incarnation sufficient to comply with the demands of pure actuality, simplicity, immutability, and the like—an understanding of the doctrine that is overlooked by their recent critics. The Christological flashpoint between opponents and modifiers of classical theism, on the one hand, and their accused counterparts, on the other, is arguably with respect to the manner of the Word’s assumption of a human nature. Most Christology debates, past and present, focus on the Hypostatic Union, with assumption being given comparatively little proper attention.10 There are undoubtedly valid historical reasons for this uneven treatment. But it does make errors or disagreements regarding assumption more difficult to recognize. It is necessary to specify the exact nature of this disagreement in order to meaningfully engage the recent criticism. Unfortunately, this specification is made exceedingly difficult by the modern tendency to reduce the options to either a divestitive account of assumption or an augmentative one. That is, the Word assumed a human nature either by subtracting something from himself, or by adding something to himself. The former is the viewpoint of various kenotic Christologies, and the latter is said to be that of traditional Christology. Edwin Chr. van Driel’s summary of the dispute is characteristic of this modern reductionism: The classical theologian thinks about the Incarnation in terms of an addition. Before the Incarnation of the Word, the second person 10 It should be noted that assumption and Hypostatic Union are not the same thing. Assumption speaks of the action in the agent assuming and the passion in the patient assumed. Union implies the relationship that follows from this. To be united may be said equally of the divine and human natures in the incarnate Word; but to assume actively is said only of the Word’s divine nature, and to be assumed is said only of the human nature. It cannot be said of the Word’s divinity that it is assumed, though it can be said that it is united. Thus, assumption and Hypostatic Union do not have the same meaning. Assumption, considered actively and passively, is what establishes the Hypostatic Union as a consequence. See the discussion in Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae [ST] III, q. 2, a. 8 (all quotations of ST will be taken from Summa Theologiae, ed. John Mortensen and Enrique Alarcón, trans. Fr. Lawrence Shapcote, O.P. [Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012]); Cf. John Owen, Christologia: Or, A Declaration of the Glorious Mystery of the Person of Christ—God and Man, in The Works of John Owen, ed. William Goold, 16 vols. (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1999; originally 1850–1852), 1:225–26. 136 James E. Dolezal of the Trinity, had one nature, divinity. In the Incarnation a second nature is added: humanity. . . . The kenotic theologian, by contrast, understands the Incarnation in terms of a divestment. The kenoticist believes that Scripture saying that the Incarnate “came down from heaven” (John 3) and “emptied himself” (Phil 2) cannot be explicated by the notion of an assumption of a temporal, limited, and suffering human life, but needs to be explained by a theory of real abandonment.11 Such alternatives present profound difficulties for the claims of classical theism, even though the augmentative account is said to be the position of classical theologians. In truth, it does not matter which of these two approaches one holds. In either case it will be necessary to ascribe privation of being and passive potency to God, and so classical theism appears doomed by both construals of Word’s assumption of our nature. It is not hard to see, given these options, why so many contemporary theologians, even those sympathetic to the claims of classical theism, believe that traditional theism needs either to be abandoned or significantly retooled in order to make room for the Word’s assumption of our nature. But are subtraction and addition the only options? I contend they are not. Thomists and other traditional Christian theists have advocated for understanding the Word’s assumption of our nature after the manner of a termination, over against both subtraction and addition. Terminative assumption is almost universally disregarded in the current literature, so much so that it is not even afforded the dignity of a refutation.12 Nevertheless, it seems to be the account of the Word’s assumption of a human nature best suited to cohere with classical theism. The principal claim is that the person of the Word terminates—in the sense of completing or perfecting—the assumed human nature by bringing it to his own subsistence and thereby supplying to it the personhood it requires for its existence. As Dominic Legge observes, “This is the greatest possible mode by which a creature (namely, Christ’s human nature) can be related to a single divine person, as a terminus according to the Son’s ‘personal esse.’”13 While God supplies concrete subsistence to the individ11 12 13 Edwin Chr. van Driel, “The Logic of Assumption,” in Exploring Kenotic Christology: The Self-Emptying of God, ed. C. Stephen Evans (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 265–66. Notable exceptions are found among several Roman Catholic Thomists, including: Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Bernard Lonergan, Thomas G. Weinandy, Gilles Emery, Thomas Joseph White, and Dominic Legge. Dominic Legge, O.P., The Trinitarian Christology of St Thomas Aquinas (Oxford: The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 137 ual natures of all other humans by way of a created hypostasis (or person), he supplies it to the human nature of Christ by drawing it into immediate relation to the divine person of the Word. The Word subsists as man not by receiving some determination or perfection of being from the assumed nature, but by perfecting this nature in being through his own divine personal being. Thomas writes, “The eternal being [esse aeternum] of the Son of God, which is the Divine Nature, becomes the being of man [esse hominis], inasmuch as the human nature is assumed by the Son of God to unity of Person.”14 Elsewhere he states, “The Word of God . . . has no subsistence from the human nature, rather, He draws the human nature to His subsistence or personality. It is not through, but in, human nature that He subsists.”15 Since drawing to oneself, and thereby supplying subsistence to that which is drawn, necessitates neither divestment nor augmentation, the Word does not subtract or add anything to himself in his assumption of a human nature, and so requires no privation of being or passive potency in order to become flesh. Such are the fundamental claims of terminative assumption. The aim of this article is chiefly to set forth the claims of terminative assumption in contrast to those of divestitive and augmentative assumption. Though this is not sufficient to resolve every question one might have about how to reconcile classical theism and Christology, it should go some distance in demonstrating that the Word’s assumption of a human nature does not necessarily render null and void the claims of traditional theism. I will first consider the two dominant alterative accounts of assumption— the divestitive and augmentative—together with some remarks on their incongruity with pure act and its entailments. Divestitive Assumption The doctrine of assumption most obviously inimical to the teaching of pure actuality, simplicity, and immutability is that in which it is claimed the divine Word necessarily underwent some real loss in becoming man. This divestitive account of assumption is maintained by all variations of kenotic Christology. Stephen Davis notes that “a kenotic christological theory is one that explains the incarnation in terms of the Logos temporarily ‘giving up’ or ‘laying aside’ or ‘divesting itself of ’ or ‘emptying itself of ’ 14 15 Oxford University Press, 2017), 106. Legge is drawing on ST III, q. 17, a. 2. ST III, q. 17, a. 2, ad 2 SCG IV, ch. 49, no. 4. The Protestant Owen agrees with St. Thomas when he says the Word actively assumed a human nature “by giving it a subsistence in his own person” (Christologia, in Works, 1:225). 138 James E. Dolezal certain properties that normally belong to divinity.”16 A brief consideration of this popular viewpoint will help us appreciate just how radical the alternative view of terminative assumption really is.17 Divestitive accounts of the Word’s assumption of a human nature are generally grounded in two basic arguments: (1) that Scripture clearly teaches, in passages such a Philippians 2:7 (from which the term kenosis is derived), 2 Corinthians 8:9, and John 17:5, that the divine person experienced genuine dispossession when he assumed a human nature; and (2) that he had to remove (or at least suspend the operation of) certain divine attributes that seem wholly incompatible with the limitations of his human nature, usually including knowledge, power, and presence. Wolfhart Pannenberg observes that for most kenoticists, “The vere homo is achieved only proportionately to subtractions from the vere deus.”18 In order to take on and make room for a human nature, ontological or operational space occupied by the Word’s divine nature must be cleared away by divestment of attributes or operations. A. M. Fairbairn speaks clearly on the need for divestment of uncreated realities in the person of the Son in order for assumption and Incarnation to occur: [A] supreme renunciation was necessary; He had to stoop from the form of God to the form of a servant. This act is described as a kenosis, an emptying of Himself. Now, this is precisely the kind of term we should expect to be used if the Incarnation was a reality. It must have involved surrender, humiliation; there could be no real assumption of the nature, the form, and the status of the created Son, if those of the uncreated were in all their integrity retained. These two things, the surrender and the assumption, are equal 16 17 18 Stephen T. Davis, “The Metaphysics of Kenosis,” in The Metaphysics of the Incarnation, ed. Anna Marmodoro and Jonathan Hill (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 118. For helpful historical and doctrinal overviews of kenoticism, see the following: Thomas R. Thompson, “Nineteenth-Century Kenotic Christology: The Waxing, Waning, and Weighing of a Quest for a Coherent Orthodoxy,” in Evans, Exploring Kenotic Christology, 76–111; Bruce McCormack, “Kenoticism in Modern Christology,” in The Oxford Handbook of Christology, ed. Francesca Aran Murphy and Troy A. Stefano (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 444–57; John Stewart Lawton, Conflict in Christology: A Study of British and American Christology, from 1889–1914 (London: SPCK, 1947), 111–64; and Thomas G. Weinandy, OFM Cap., Does God Change? The Word’s Becoming in the Incarnation (Still River, MA: St. Bede’s, 1985), 101–23. Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus—God and Man, trans. Lewis L. Wilkins and Duane A Priebe, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1977), 311. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 139 and coincident; but it is through the former that the latter must be understood.19 In other words: no divestment, no assumption. John Macpherson also makes this claim: When the Son of God, the Divine Logos, became flesh, He submitted Himself to the limitations of time and space, and surrendered the eternal mode of existence in assuming the temporal mode of existence. This of necessity meant that the limitations of His mode of manifestation gave no room for the exercise of those attributes of God which do not recognise the restrictions of time and space. It is quite distinctly implied in the gospel story, and throughout all the New Testament, that Jesus Christ in His incarnate life was absolutely without the divine attributes of Omnipotence, Omniscience, and Omnipresence.20 It is clear from both of these statements that kenoticists do not hold God to be absolutely simple or immutable. For them, he is a being susceptible to loss of actuality. Insomuch as they believe it is the selfsame subject who perdures through this loss, they are positively committed to the belief that God is composed of parts. Classical theism is necessarily incompatible with such a viewpoint. Even critics of kenoticism, such as John Lawton, find it difficult not to concede some sort of divestment on the Word’s part in assuming a human nature. According to Lawton, the Word’s becoming man was not something that occurred “in addition to an otherwise untrammeled existence, but something which entailed a sacrifice or a temporary giving up on his part, something which involved a renunciation of things which it was his right to possess.”21 From the perspective of the classical theist, if the Word’s divine existence is restrained or impeded in any fashion, even by the assumption of a finite human nature, then God is certainly not pure act, no boundless ocean of being, as John of Damascus would have it. Hans Urs von Balthasar and Bruce McCormack are more recent advocates for kenotic Christology who undertake to ensure that the vere deus is not compromised by the Word’s emptying of himself. Balthasar is willing 19 20 21 A. M. Fairbairn, The Place of Christ in Modern Theology (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1907), 476. John Macpherson, Christian Dogmatics (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1898), 300–301. Lawton, Conflict in Christology, 133. 140 James E. Dolezal to relinquish strong immutability, but still retains a place for the language of divine impassibility: “On the one hand, God’s changelessness must not be defended in such a manner that in the pre-mundane Logos nothing real took place. On the other hand, this real event could not be allowed to degenerate into theopaschism.”22 What is this real event that took place in the pre-mundane Logos when he assumed a human nature? Balthasar answers, the loss of his glorious condition. The “form of God” and “form of a servant” (from Phil 2:6–7) are said to be incompatible conditions. If they were compatible, then “nothing would really have happened in God himself”23 when the Word became flesh. This happening within God is in fact a change the divine person undergoes. As Balthasar notes, “The Subject, doubtless, remains the same . . . but a change in the condition of the Subject is unavoidable.”24 The influence of the assumed nature upon the person of the Word extends to the Father and Spirit as well: “The event of the Incarnation of the second divine Person does not leave the inter-relationship of those Persons unaffected. . . . [They] must also be affected by the Son’s humanity.”25 Whatever novelty is involved in the Incarnation is thus not restricted to the created order of being proper to the assumed human nature, but touches God intrinsically. In words cited from Paul Althaus, Balthasar declares that Christology must be thought out from the vantage point of the Cross and that Christ’s powerlessness and death anguish “cannot keep unscathed the ‘divine nature.’” Indeed, Christ’s Passion is simply the “undiminished divinity of God . . . at work.” It is “a law of the divine life itself.” The consequence of this is that “the old conception of God’s immutability breaks into pieces.” The new conception, by contrast, imagines kenosis as characteristic of the intra-divine life of God itself. In this way the Word’s experience of loss in the assumption of a human nature, while a distinct instance and type of kenosis, is in important respects just a novel extension of the kenotic character of the divine intra-Trinitarian relations: “God himself really entered into suffering, and in that very entrance is and remains entirely God.”26 McCormack proposes a kenotic theory with distinct parallels to 22 23 24 25 26 Hans Urs von Balthasar, Mysterium Pachale: The Mystery of Easter, trans. Aidan Nichols, O.P. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000), 25. Balthasar, Mysterium Pachale, 27. Balthasar, Mysterium Pachale, 27. Balthasar, Mysterium Pachale, 30. Balthasar, Mysterium Pachale, 33. For an illuminating discussion of Balthasar’s teaching on this score, see Gerard F. O’Hanlon’s chapter “Christ and God’s Immutability,” in The Immutability of God in the Theology of Hans Urs von Balthasar (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 9–49. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 141 Balthasar’s, but that is said not to require mutability in God. McCormack achieves this, like Balthasar, by “making kenosis original to the being of God so that its concretization in time involves no change in God.”27 If God is by nature self-emptying, or self-divesting, then the self-emptying of the Son by the assumption of flesh entails no essential change in him. McCormack can say that, in the kenosis that characterizes the Word’s assumption of the form of a servant, “no divestment of anything proper to God is entailed.”28 But this is only because McCormack has made divestment itself proper to God. It is hard not to see this view as deeply ironic, and perhaps nonsensical: God is by nature a self-divesting being and further divestment by the assumption of flesh does not produce any change in the divine person from that which he already is qua divine. McCormack calls this divine immutability, but it is, as he says, “no longer controlled by the idea of impassibility.”29 The kenotic theories, old and new, are deserving of a more extended examination and evaluation than can be provided here.30 It is enough for our present purposes to observe that they require a real distinction in God between act and passive potency just insomuch as they conceive the Word suffering a loss of some sort of divine actuality, even if only an accidental condition or experience of glory. In order for something new to “happen” in God himself, God must be characterized by privation of being and passive potency. All varieties of kenoticism necessarily proscribe ontologically robust understandings of divine impassibility and immutability. Augmentative Assumption Anti-kenoticists have a counterargument almost perfectly matched to the claims of divestment. Rather than subtract something from himself in the 27 28 29 30 McCormack, “Kenoticism in Modern Christology,” 454–55. McCormack, “Kenoticism in Modern Christology,” 455. McCormack, “Kenoticism in Modern Christology,” 456. It is beyond the scope of my present concern to offer a thorough critique of the coherence of such a claim, though I do not believe it is intellectually defensible to hold both that divine persons undergo experiences of passion and that these experiences do not amount to mutation. Any reduction of passive potency to act, which is requisite in every instance of passion, is necessarily a change. For a critical analysis of the roots and rationale of recent kenoticism, with its insistence that divestment and change are intrinsic to the intra-Trinitarian life of God, see Bruce D. Marshall, “The Absolute and the Trinity,” Pro Ecclesia 23, no. 2 (2014): 147–64. See also Thomas Joseph White, “The Two Natures of Christ in the Crucifixion: The Cross as a Revelation of Divine Love,” Angelicum (forthcoming). 142 James E. Dolezal assumption of our nature, the Word added something to himself. It is easy to see the polemical appeal of this riposte. It is neat and to the point— addition, not subtraction. So pervasive has this augmentative alterative to kenoticism become that it is now widely assumed simply to be the traditional orthodox position. The whole debate between kenoticists and their more traditionally minded critics is said to come down to whether “in his incarnation the Logos emptied himself of certain properties normally characteristic of divinity or else simply added a new human nature to his already existing divine nature.”31 Addition appears to have the obvious advantage over subtraction of leaving intact the Son’s divine nature. Aloys Grillmeier, in his monumental study of patristic Christology, writes: By becoming man, the pre-existent Christ, who exists in a divine mode of being, chooses a mode of existence which is a concealment of his proper being. Historical existence as man can never express what the pre-existent Christ is in himself. Because this kenosis is a “taking,” or better an “adding,” the first kind of being is not done away with. He who is on an equality with God adds something to his divinity, the form of a servant.32 Eleonore Stump explains Thomas Aquinas’s teaching in similar terms: “At a certain moment in time, the second person of the Trinity assumed a human nature. That is to say, the second person added to himself another nature, in addition to the divine nature already his own. . . . In Christ’s case, the human nature is added to Christ from conception.”33 This claim is almost ubiquitous in contemporary Reformed and evangelical literature on the topic. A few representative citations must suffice to demonstrate this trend. John Murray denies the Incarnation involves the divine Son in “divestiture and transmutation.” Instead, he states, “the incarnation means addition and conjunction, not subtraction.”34 Millard 31 32 33 34 Davis, “Metaphysics of Kenosis,” 125. Aloys Grillmeier, S.J., Christ in Christian Tradition, vol. 1, From the Apostolic Age to Chalcedon (451), trans. John Bowden, 2nd ed. (Atlanta: John Knox, 1975), 21. Given the extensive primary source documentation found throughout Grillmeier’s volume, it is noteworthy that he supplies no reference to an early Church Father or council to substantiate this claim about the manner of Christ’s kenosis. Eleonore Stump, Aquinas (New York: Routledge, 2003), 408, 423. Stump references ST III, q. 2, a. 8, in support of her claim. But Thomas’s text makes no mention of addition made to the person of the Word. John Murray, Collected Writings of John Murray, vol. 2, Select Lectures in Systematic Theology (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1977), 136. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 143 Erickson claims that Christ “retained the μορφὴ of God, but added to it the form a servant.”35 Robert Letham says the same: He remained the Word. What is there, and who is there, after the ἐγένετο [John 1:14], the becoming, is the same as what was there and who was there before. The difference is that there is now an addition. The Word now has a full human nature. In the words of Paul, he who was—and eternally is—“in the form of God” has now added “the form of a servant” (Phil. 2:6–8). He has not ceased to be in the form of God. There is no subtraction, only addition. It is the Word who is the subject of the whole event. . . . He emptied himself not by ceasing to be what he always was but by becoming what he previously was not, not by subtraction but addition.36 Rob Lister says that “the person of Christ is the divine Logos, to which a human nature was added.”37 And Stephen Wellum advances this same view. Remarking on Paul’s words in Philippians 2:7, he writes: “The text says nothing about Christ emptying his divine attributes. Rather, he empties himself by adding to himself a complete human nature and a willingness to undergo the agony of death for our sake and for our salvation.”38 The Incarnation “was the real addition of a human nature, but it was not the reduction or renunciation of his deity.”39 Moreover, “Scripture teaches, and the church confesses, that Christ’s humanity is an addition to his deity and not a replacement of it.”40 Wellum insists this is the traditional view of Christian orthodoxy: “Historically, orthodoxy . . . affirmed that the incarnation was an act of addition, not subtraction. . . . The classical view insists that the divine Son, in assuming a concrete human nature, became human by adding to himself a human body and soul.”41 The Word “added to himself a human nature.”42 Such statements are primarily intended to 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 Millard J. Erickson, The Word Became Flesh: A Contemporary Incarnational Christology (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1991), 555. Erickson calls this “kenosis by addition.” Robert Letham, Systematic Theology (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019), 477–78, 538. Rob Lister, God is Impassible and Impassioned: Toward a Theology of Divine Emotion (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 265n11. Stephen J. Wellum, God the Son Incarnate: The Doctrine of Christ (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016), 177. Wellum, God the Son Incarnate, 370 Wellum, God the Son Incarnate, 363 (emphasis original). Wellum, God the Son Incarnate, 376, 400 (emphasis original). Wellum, God the Son Incarnate, 411. 144 James E. Dolezal counter the inherent divine mutablism of the kenotic Christologies. But, as will be discussed below, they seem to trade substantive mutation for accidental mutation, at least implicitly. Adherents to augmentative assumption assert both biblical and historical support for their claim that the Word added a human nature to himself. But these claims are conspicuously lacking in textual corroboration. The few biblical passages that describe the act of assumption proper do not use the language of addition. The most explicit statement about assumption in the New Testament, Philippians 2:7, speaks of taking to, not adding to: “taking the form of a bond-servant.” The term for “taking” is λαβών (from λαμβάνω). It means “to take hold of” and can have the sense of “to make one’s own.” It does not properly mean “to add to oneself,” though taking to oneself by addition is not, in itself, metaphysically impossible. At all events, taking to, or assumption, without any further qualification, is not synonymous with adding to.43 Yet this seems to be the supposition of those who say the Son added to himself a human nature.44 From the viewpoint of classical theism, this conflation of assumption with addition is a mistake (not merely linguistic, but also conceptual) which carries with it deleterious theological implications. What then of the alleged support from traditional theology? Given the current consensus, one would think patristic and medieval texts claiming an addition made to the Word would be easy to come by. In reality, such evidence is scarce. And, if perchance one discovers such a text, it may well turn out not to provide the hoped-for support. Taking just one example, consider the few places in Saint Augustine’s tractates and homilies on John’s Gospel where he says the Son added something to himself in the Incarnation. “Man was added to [accessit] Him, God not lost to Him.”45 “The man therefore was added to [accessit] the God, that He might be man who was God.”46 “Something was added to [accessit] Him from time, not anything went from [decessit] His eternity.”47 Rendering accessit (from 43 44 45 46 47 If the New Testament writers had wanted to explain the Son’s assumption of a human nature as an addition, we might have expected them to use a term such as προστίθημι or some close cognate. Consider, for example, the following explanation of Phil 2:7 from Thomas R. Schreiner: “The emptying consisted not in the removal of Christ’s deity but rather in the addition of his humanity. Paul utilizes paradoxical language by describing Christ’s emptying in terms of adding” (New Testament Theology: Magnifying God in Christ [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], 325). Augustine, In Iohannis evangelium tractatus, tract. 8, no. 2. Augustine, In Iohannis evangelium tractatus, tract. 21, no. 7. Augustine, In Iohannis evangelium tractatus, hom. 2, no. 10. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 145 accedo) as “added to,” which is a valid translation of the term, may not exactly correspond to Augustine’s intended meaning. The term can also be translated “to join” or “to draw near,” in which case Augustine may be saying nothing more than that the divine Son drew a human nature near to himself, or that the Son came near to a human nature, in such a manner that he was both true man while remaining true God; this is just to claim assumption or Hypostatic Union. The word accessit does not in itself require the assumption to be augmentative or additive in character. One would have to know something more about the manner of the assumption, and the nature of that which terminates the assumption, in order to determine whether or not it was assumption by addition. At any rate, if Augustine had unambiguously intended to claim an addition made to the Word, he might simply have deployed the term addo; but he does not. The claims of augmentative assumption are seldom accompanied by metaphysical elaboration. Just what is the manner of this purported addition of a human nature to the Word? Is it substantive or accidental? If substantive, it is difficult to see how one avoids either Nestorianism (the conjunction of two complete substances, which is really an accidental conjunction), on the one hand, or Monophysitism (two essential parts coming together to constitute a single nature), on the other. If humanity is added to divinity in order to bring about a compound substance—the two natures functioning as two conjoined essential parts, perhaps similar to the way matter and form are joined to make a composite material substance—then Monophysitism appears inevitable. In any case, it does not seem that most adherents to augmentative assumption intend any sort of substantive addition, whatever that might entail. Rather, if anything, they tend to speak of the addition in terms more befitting the acquisition of an accident by a substance. Mullins is clear about the human nature being related to the Word after the manner of an accident: “The Son’s human nature is accidental to Him.”48 Similarly, Bruce Ware, after affirming the standard augmentative view—“adding human nature to his divine nature”49—proceeds to explain this addition by two analogies, both of which suggest the addition of an 48 49 Mullins, End of the Timeless God, 184. This way of speaking, though, may stem from Mullins’s tendency to confuse contingency and accidentality. Not all contingencies are accidents. For example, a dog’s act of existence (esse) may be contingent, but existence is not one of its accidents. And it does not belong to the animal by way of inherence, as all accidents do to those substances that have them. Bruce A. Ware, The Man Christ Jesus: Theological Reflections on the Humanity of Christ (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2013), 20. 146 James E. Dolezal accident. The first is a brilliantly painted car covered in mud, which, even though its glory is obscured, is still the selfsame brilliant car underneath. The second is a king who puts on the clothes of a beggar, moves into the street, and adopts a beggar’s behavior in order to discover what life is like for his unfortunate subjects, all the while possessing all his kingly qualities, though hidden and unused for a time.50 These analogies imply that the addition of a human nature is after the manner of adding a habit, an action, or a place. But to add to oneself a habit, action, or location is to take on an accident, these being three of Aristotle’s well-known nine categories of accidents. If augmentative assumption turns out to mean the Word takes on a human nature after the fashion of an accident—and it is difficult to see how it does not mean this—then the fundamental claims of classical theism are rendered incompatible with it. Accidental addition entails the reduction of some passive potency in the substance to actuality. It also means that the substance gains a new determination of being above and beyond the actuality of its substance.51 Terminative Assumption If doctrines like pure actuality and divine simplicity cannot be reconciled to either a divestitive or an augmentative view of the Word’s assumption of a human nature, then it seems the classical Christian theist is caught on the horns of a dilemma. He must choose between holding to the Incarnation of the Son, on the one hand, or the core claims of traditional theism, on the other. But, as indicated above, this is a false alternative. A third way of understanding assumption is available that coheres with classical theism’s core doctrines—namely, terminative assumption. The fundamental claims of this doctrine have already been introduced. In this section the motivation, meaning, and rationale of terminative assumption will be examined in greater detail. No Addition Made to the Word In order to appreciate what motivates the doctrine of terminative assumption, the reasons for rejecting augmentative assumption must be grasped. Several classical theologians deny that the Word’s assumption of a human 50 51 See Ware, The Man Christ Jesus, 20–23. Aquinas perceives yet another problem with saying the Word possesses his human nature as an accident: “And in saying that the union of the Word to the soul and human flesh was accidental, one must be saying that the Word after the union was not subsistent in two natures. And this Eutyches said. For nothing subsists in that to which it is accidentally united” (SCG IV, ch. 37, no. 10). The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 147 nature involves an addition he makes to himself. Thomas Aquinas considers a possible objection to a divine person assuming a created nature in which the problem of addition is raised explicitly: It would seem that it is not befitting to a Divine Person to assume a created nature. For a Divine Person signifies something most perfect. Now no addition can be made to what is perfect. Therefore, since to assume is to take to oneself, and consequently what is assumed is added to the one who assumes, it does not seem to be befitting to a Divine Person to assume a created nature.52 This concern about divine perfection is one Thomas takes seriously, and he grants the objector’s major premise: no addition can be made to that which is already perfect in being. But he does not grant that assumption entails addition. He offers the following reply: “Since the Divine Person is infinite, no addition can be made to it [non potest ei fieri additio]: Hence Cyril says: ‘We do not conceive the mode of conjunction to be according to addition’; just as in the union of man with God, nothing is added to God by the grace of adoption, but what is Divine is united to man; hence, not God but man is perfected.”53 As Thomas says elsewhere, “the person of the Son of God . . . was not in any way augmented or perfected by the assumed human nature.”54 Indeed, “the Word of God from all eternity had complete being [esse completum] in hypostasis or person.”55 Any real addition would bring a new perfection of being to the subject, and so an infinite being, which as such is unboundedly perfect in being, cannot assume a human nature to itself by way of addition. Infinity and absolute perfection simply cannot be augmented. All augmentation, like all mutation, requires a privation of being in the subject; and there is no privation of being in God. Similar denials are found in the works of various classic Lutheran and Reformed voices. The Lutheran Solid Declaration of the Formula of Concord states, “Nothing was added to or taken away from his divine 52 53 54 55 ST III, q. 3, a. 1, obj. 1. ST III, q. 3, a. 1, ad. 1. See also ST III, q. 2, a. 2, ad 1, in which Thomas says the Word’s divine nature does not receive “any addition or change” from the assumed human nature. Thomas Aquinas, De unione Verbi incarnati, a. 4, trans. Roger W. Nutt (Leuven: Peeters, 2015). There is no real distinction between person and nature in God, but only a conceptual one. Thus, both person and nature are infinite, as Thomas states in De unione, a. 1, ad 15: “It should be said that the person of the Word is infinite, just as the nature of the Word is infinite.” ST III, q. 2, a. 6, ad 2. 148 James E. Dolezal nature in its essence or characteristics through the incarnation.”56 The Reformed theologian William Ames (1576–1633) claims the Hypostatic Union of divinity and humanity in the divine person is not by a real addition made unto him: “The union adds nothing to the divine person and nature except a relationship.”57 The New England Congregationalist John Norton (1606–1663) agrees with Ames: “To the divine nature is not added anything, only a relation; but to the human nature, there is added a real change.”58 John Owen (1616–1683) is also abundantly clear on this point. Though Christ took our nature to be his own, “it was no addition unto him.”59 This is due to God’s aseity and plentitude of being: “God alone wants nothing, stands in need of nothing; nothing can be added unto him, seeing he ‘giveth unto all life, and breath, and all things,’ Acts xvii.25.”60 So absolutely perfect, infinite, and self-sufficient is the divine nature and person of the Son of God that “nothing can be taken from him, nothing added unto him.”61 The Particular Baptist theologian John Gill (1697–1771) is equally emphatic in repudiating any addition made to the divine nature and person in the act of assumption: 56 57 58 59 60 61 The Solid Declaration, art. 8, no. 49, in The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, ed. Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2000). William Ames, The Marrow of Theology, trans. John Dykstra Eusden (Boston: Pilgrim, 1968), 1.18.17. John Norton, The Orthodox Evangelist (London: John Macok, 1657), 44–45. By “relationship” and “relation” Ames and Norton almost certainly mean a relation of reason or a logical relation. Thomas Aquinas explains why God can be related to his creatures only by a relation of reason, and not by a real relation: “For it must be universally held that no relation of God to creature really exists in God, but such is only a mental relation because God is above every order of creature and is the measure of every creature from which every creature derives, and not conversely. . . . Now in Christ we assign only one supposit and one hypostasis, just as we also assign one person which is an eternal supposit in which there can be no real relation to a creature” (Quodlibet I, q. 2, a. 1, in Quodlibetal Questions 1 and 2, trans. Sandra Edwards [Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1983]). Bernard Lonergan states that, “truths contingently and properly predicated of a divine person add nothing to that divine subsistent relation except a relation of reason.” The Ontological and Psychological Constitution of Christ, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002), 111. See also: ST I, q. 13, a. 7; III, q. 2, a. 7; Weinandy, Does God Change?, 88–98; Herbert McCabe, God Matters (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1987), 45; Michael J. Dodds, O.P., The One Creator God in Thomas Aquinas and Contemporary Theology (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2020), 93–100. John Owen, The Glory of Christ, in Works, 1:323. Owen, Glory of Christ, in Works, 1:325. Owen, Glory of Christ, in Works, 1:325. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 149 By the incarnation nothing is added to, nor altered in the divine nature and personality of Christ. The human nature adds nothing to either of them; they remain the same they ever were. . . . The human nature has its subsistence in his Person, and has a glory and excellency given it; but that gives nothing at all to the nature and Person of the divine Word and Son of God.62 An addition would change the divine person by giving to him a form of being (i.e., new act of some sort) lacking in himself. As no perfection of being is lacking in God, all addition to the divine nature or person is ruled out. Also underlying this denial of addition to the Word is the commitment of Thomas and his followers to the truth that every effect preexists in its efficient cause. Since God is the efficient cause of all things, the perfection of being of all his creatures already exists in him, albeit in a more eminent way. For this reason no creature can add anything to him. Thomas sets forth the claim, “All created perfections are in God,” and offers two arguments in support.63 First, any perfection that exists in an effect must also be found in its efficient cause. After all, a thing cannot give what it does not have. In univocal agents these perfections exist “in the same formality,” as for instance a human who begets another human. In equivocal agents these perfections exist in a more eminent degree, that is, in a more perfect way than they do in the effect. Thomas writes: Now it is plain that the effect pre-exists virtually in the efficient cause: and although to pre-exist in the potentiality of a material cause is to pre-exist in a more imperfect way, since matter as such is imperfect, and an agent as such is perfect; still to pre-exist virtually in the efficient cause is to pre-exist not in a more imperfect, but in a more perfect way. Since therefore God is the first effective cause of things, the perfections of all things must pre-exist in God in a more eminent way.64 62 63 64 John Gill, A Body of Divinity (Grand Rapids, MI: Sovereign Grace, 1971; originally 1769), 382–83. Aquinas, ST I, q. 4, a. 2. ST I, q. 4, a. 2. Effects preexist only as potentialities in their material causes, as the form of a house might be said to preexist in a pile of lumber. And potentiality is less in being than is actuality. In intelligent agents, which are efficient causes, effects preexist as actual forms, and ideal ones at that. For instance, the form of a house in an architect’s mind is more perfect than the same form as it comes to exist concretely in wood or some other material. Thomas says that agents as such are perfect because an agent, qua agent, is in act, not potency. And act is what perfects a thing in being, not potency. On the claim that agents are unchanged 150 James E. Dolezal Thomas’s second argument is more straightforward: “Since therefore God is subsisting being itself [ipsum esse subsistens], nothing of the perfection of being can be wanting to Him. Now all created perfections are included in the perfection of being; for things are perfect, precisely so far as they have being after some fashion. It follows therefore that the perfection of no one thing is wanting to God.”65 Several prominent early-modern Protestants apply Aquinas’s reasoning to the question of the Word’s assumption of a human nature and to the Hypostatic Union, insisting no change or acquisition can be ascribed to the divine person. Stephen Charnock (1628–1680) writes: Again, there could be no change in this union; for, in a real change, something is acquired which was not possessed before, neither formally nor eminently: but the divinity had from eternity, before the incarnation, all the perfections of the human nature eminently in a nobler manner than they are in themselves, and therefore could not be changed by a real union.66 Owen concurs: “All being is essentially in him, and in comparison thereunto all other things are as nothing.”67 The comparative nothing of the human nature—which surely accounts, at least in part, for the kenotic character of the Word’s Incarnation—cannot make a real addition to the infinite being and agent from whom it derives all that it is; but this does not mean it cannot be taken into a special sort of union with that agent.68 65 66 67 68 by their acts of agency, see J. A. McWilliams, S.J., “Action Does Not Change the Agent,” in Philosophical Studies in Honor of the Very Reverend Ignatius Smith, O.P., ed. John K. Ryan (Westminster, MD: Newman Press, 1952), 208–21. ST I, q. 4, a. 2. See also Joseph Pohle and Arthur Preuss, Christology: A Dogmatic Treatise on the Incarnation, 5th ed. (St. Louis, MO: B. Herder, 1925), 123: “For every creatural perfection, no matter how exalted, is virtually and eminently contained in the perfection of God, and consequently cannot add one jot or tittle to it.” Stephen Charnock, The Existence and Attributes of God, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1979; originally 1853), 1:340. Owen, Glory of Christ, in Works, 1:324. In his commentary on Phil 2:7, Aquinas writes, “How beautiful to say that he emptied himself, for the empty is opposed to the full! For the divine nature is sufficiently full, because every perfection of goodness is there. . . . But human nature and the soul are not full, but capable of fullness, because it was made as a slate not written upon. Therefore, human nature is empty. Hence he says, he emptied himself, because he assumed a human nature” (Super Phil 2, lec. 2 (no. 57), trans. F. R. Larcher, O.P., ed. John Mortensen and Enrique Alarcón [Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012]). For a fine study of St. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 151 We turn now to consider the peculiar manner of this assumption of the human nature unto the divine person. The Word Terminates the Assumed Human Nature The impossibility of attributing subtraction or addition to an infinite God, together with the firm conviction that the divine Word became flesh, and so is true God and true man, compels theologians to find a way to coherently articulate the Word’s assumption of a human nature that satisfies all the data, even if not rendering these mysteries comprehensible to us.69 Terminative assumption satisfies the requirements of these theological data. We must first consider what is meant by termination and why it is important for our understanding of the Incarnation. Human nature requires a hypostasis, or person, in order to subsist. It does not subsist of itself.70 At the risk of oversimplifying this point, we might observe that there never was or will be an actual human nature that is not the human nature of someone, or of whom. There cannot be a concrete subsisting human nature that is not the nature of anyone in particular. Moreover, this someone-ness or who-ness, to express it rather clumsily, is really different and distinct among all humans. One man’s human nature is generically and specifically identical with that of all other humans; but who he is as this man, and no other, is unique to him as a supposit. Since human nature as such never exists except as the human nature of someone, of a hypostasis, and among humans to be a particular someone is not strictly identical with the human nature as such, every human nature requires a distinct hypostasis to establish it and perfect it in being. It is brought to complete realization in being when it is made the nature of a person. Thus, personhood terminates, or completes, the being of a rational nature. Ordinarily, human nature terminates in a created hypostasis, a human person. But it is arguably not a fixed law of human nature that it terminate 69 70 Thomas’s understanding of kenosis, see Gilles Emery, O.P., “Kenosis, Christ, and the Trinity in Thomas Aquinas,” Nova et Vetera (English), vol. 17, no. 3 (2019): 839–69. St. Thomas says, “Indeed, among divine works, this most especially exceeds the reason [rationem excedit]: for nothing can be thought of which is more marvelous than this divine accomplishment: that the true God, the Son of God, should become true man” (SCG IV, ch. 27, no. 1). Aquinas makes this observation in De potentia, q. 9, a. 5, ad 13: “In created things . . . the common nature does not subsist by itself except in the individual” (trans. English Dominican Fathers [Westminster, MD: Newman Press, 1952]). Person is the principle of subsistence in created rational natures. 152 James E. Dolezal in a finite, created person; only that it terminate in a rational hypostasis.71 In every instance of a human nature other than that of Jesus of Nazareth, the nature is terminated in a created person. Aquinas notes this Christological exception: “But the human generation of Christ had as ultimate term union with the divine Person, and not the establishment of a human person or hypostasis.” 72 What ensures that who Jesus of Nazareth is none other than the divine Word himself is that his human nature finds its hypostatic terminus—and thus receives its concrete subsistence in being— in that divine person of the Word. No doubt, this is John of Damascus’s meaning when he says the person of the Word “became Person to the flesh.” Inversely, this is also what ensures that it is truly the divine Word who is the man Christ Jesus.73 In assuming a human nature, the Word takes a created nature to himself in such a manner that his own divine person supplies the hypostasis to that nature. Thus, it is the divine Word, and no created person, who is the child begotten of the Virgin Mary. What is generated in Mary’s womb is created; who is generated is uncreated. The human nature of Christ does not preexist its assumption by, or union to, the divine Word, but rather is assumed and united to him in its very inception in the Virgin’s womb. Legge writes: “From the first instant of Christ’s human life, Christ’s humanity has a ‘relation’ to the divine Word himself, according to the 71 72 73 Michael Gorman offers a scintillating examination of the question of whether or not human natures as such are person-grounding, devoting special attention to why Christ’s humanity does not ground its own supposit. See Aquinas on the Metaphysics of the Hypostatic Union (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 73–100. SCG IV, ch. 45, no. 3. For guidance in expressing such Christological mysteries, one could hardly do better than to consult Aquinas’s discussion in ST III, q. 16. McCabe argues that since God and creatures are not correlative items within a single universal order of being, it is not necessarily impossible or absurd to say a man is God, as it would be, for instance, to say a man is a sheep. There is no natural conflict or incompatibility of species between God and man, as there is between humans and all other creatures, because God simply exists beyond the confines of genus and species. He is not a kind or sort of anything (see ST I, q. 3, a. 5). Note, though, that to say a man is God is not to say humanity is divinity. McCabe writes: “It may be part of the meaning of man that he is not any other creature; it cannot be part of the meaning of man that he is not God. God is not one of the items in some universe which have to be excluded if it is just man that you are talking about. God could not be an item in any universe” (God Matters, 57–58). See also Lonergan, Ontological and Psychological Constitution, 103, and Thomas Joseph White, O.P., The Incarnate Lord: A Thomistic Study in Christology (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2015), 117–18. The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 153 Word’s ‘pre-existing personal esse,’ a relation so profound and exalted that there is no merely human personhood in Christ, nor a human hypostasis or supposit. But only the personhood of the Word.” 74 “To assume is to take to oneself.” 75 Saint Thomas explains that the word “assumption” signifies two things, namely, the principle of the action and the term of it. The principle of assumption is the divine nature, it being the power by which assumption takes place, and thus assumption is principally an act common to all three divine persons. But, as Thomas notes, “the term of the assumption [terminum assumptionis] does not belong to the Divine Nature in itself, but by reason of the Person in Whom It is considered to be.” 76 The assumption “is terminated in the Person of the Word.” 77 And again, “This assumption is terminated in a Person.” 78 The Lutheran Johann Gerhard (1582–1637) writes: “The act of assumption proceeds from the divine power common to the three persons; the terminus of the assumption is the hypostasis that belongs to the Son.” 79 And the Reformed theologian Francis Turretin (1623–1687) agrees with Aquinas and Gerhard: This union can be viewed either in respect of its principle or in respect of its terminus. In the former sense it is attributed to the whole Trinity, by the power of which such union is made. . . . In the latter, it belongs to the Logos alone because it is terminated on him. Although the person of the Logos may well be said to have been incarnate, yet the Trinity itself may not because the incarnation is not terminated on the divine nature absolutely, but on the person of the Logos relatively.80 The union of a rational soul and body, which is necessary to constitute any human nature, is of greater dignity in Christ than it is in other humans, “for the very reason,” explains Saint Thomas, “that it does not have its end-point [terminatur] in a created suppositum, but in the eternal suppositum of the Word of God.”81 It receives its completion in being from the divine person to whom it is united. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange states 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 Legge, Trinitarian Christology of St Thomas Aquinas, 108–9. De potentia, q. 6, a. 7, ad 5. ST III, q. 3, a. 3. ST III, q. 3, a. 3, ad 2: “terminari ad personam verbi.” ST III, q. 4, a. 4: “quia assumptio ista terminatur ad personam.” Johann Gerhard, On Person and Office of Christ, ed. Benjamin T. G. Mayes, trans. Richard J. Dinda (St. Louis, MO: Concordia, 2009), ch. 7, § 103. Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, ed. James T. Dennison, trans. George Musgrave Giger, vol. 2 (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1994), top. 13, q. 6, a. 4. De unione, a. 2, ad 12. 154 James E. Dolezal this succinctly: “Assumption is properly an action by which the human nature is drawn into the subsistence of the Son, so that it may subsist by his subsistence. Hence this action not only produces in the human nature of Christ a relation of dependence on the Word, but communicates to it the personality of the Word.”82 This, in short, is what it means to say that the Word became flesh and that he took to himself the form of a servant. He just is the hypostatic terminus of the created human nature he assumes. This is what enables us to say it was none other than God himself, in the person of the Word, who was born of Mary; that a man is Creator and is God. Aquinas remarks: “A man is called Creator and is God because of the union, inasmuch as it is terminated in the Divine hypostasis.”83 While all of this is of inestimable benefit and gain to the assumed nature, it is neither loss nor gain to the assuming agent and term, that is, the Word himself. A qualification is in order at this point. We must be careful not to think that the Word actualizes and completes the being of the assumed nature the way an informing form brings actuality to some greater whole of which it is a part. The Word is not a “part” of the incarnate Christ.84 Garrigou-Lagrange unpacks the rationale of this claim: The informing form is related to the whole to which it is ordered as the less perfect part, just as the soul is less perfect than the complete man. On the contrary, the terminating perfection is not ordered to the more complete whole, but rather draws the other to Himself. Hence, instead of involving any imperfection, God imparts His perfection to what is assumed.85 82 83 84 85 Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., Christ the Savior: A Commentary on the Third Part of St. Thomas’ Theological Summa, trans. Dom Bede Rose (St. Louis, MO: B. Herder, 1950), 201. ST III, q. 2, a. 7, ad 3: “terminatur ad hypostasim divinam.” Though Thomas believes there is a way to speak of the Word as a composite person, “insomuch as one being subsists in two [natures],” he is clear that this “composition of person . . . is not on account of parts, but by reason of number” (ST III, q. 2, a. 4; q. 2, a. 4, ad 2). Garrigou-Lagrange, Christ the Savior, 41. See also Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., The One God: A Commentary on the First Part of St. Thomas’ Theological Summa, trans. Dom Bede Rose (St. Louis, MO: B. Herder, 1946), 194: “In the hypostatic union, the Word is united, indeed, in the entitative order with the humanity of Christ, but not as the informing form, but as the Person terminating the humanity and communicating to it His existence. And thus the Word does not enter into composition with Christ, because the Word is not related to Christ as a part, for the part is always less perfect than the whole.” Garrigou-Lagrange insists that this claim is vital in order to avoid conceiving the Hypostatic Union The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 155 The Word is neither a receiving subject of the assumed nature, nor is himself, since he is actus purus, received by the assumed nature after the manner of an informing act: “Expressed more briefly, we may say that the Pure Act is unreceived and unreceivable. If He were received in any potency, He would be subjected to participation and limitation; if, however, He were to receive, then He would be in potency for a further act.”86 Terminative assumption enables us to say that the divine person of the Word is a man without thereby demoting him to the inferior status of a part, or to the status of a finite entity by suggesting that he receives a new determination of being. Finally, it will be helpful if we can illustrate what we mean when we speak of termination as requiring neither subtraction nor addition in the terminus. Garrigou-Lagrange, in denying the Word receives anything by assuming a human nature, uses the analogies of a point terminating a line and a seen object terminating one’s visual faculty: That the Word possesses the human nature in a receptive sense, this I deny; in a terminative sense, this I concede. To possess a form in a receptive sense is to be the subject of this form, just as matter receives its form, or a substance receives accidental forms; but such is not the case when a subject has some form in a personal or terminative sense. The Word, however, possesses the human nature not in a receptive sense, because He is not in passive potency to receive it; but He possesses it personally and terminatively, in so far as He is its intrinsic terminus, intrinsically completing it and terminating it, just as the point terminates the line, or the object seen terminates the visual faculty.87 A line segment is perfected or completed by the points that terminate it. But a point is not in any way altered, neither diminished nor enlarged, by its terminative role since points have no length, thickness, or depth; and they are complete in themselves whether or not any line segment terminates in them. A point receives nothing but a relation of reason in becoming the terminus of some line segment, even though it becomes intrinsic to the line segment itself. Point A, for instance, undergoes no change in itself by becoming a terminus for line segment AB. The relation to the point is 86 87 along pantheistic lines. The Word’s relation to his assumed humanity as terminating act avoids confusion of the divine and human in Christ. Garrigou-Lagrange, Christ the Savior, 42. Garrigou-Lagrange, Christ the Savior, 40–41. See also Pohle and Preuss, Christology, 123. 156 James E. Dolezal real in the line segment; it is only rational in the point. The point really perfects the line segment in being, but without undergoing any change in itself. The same can be said for visible objects terminating a viewer’s vision. The seen object actualizes sight in the viewer’s visual faculty, moving it from passive potency to completion in act. In the viewer there is a real relation to the visible object seen; but the seen object receives nothing from the visual faculty it actualizes and terminates. In both of these analogies it should be noted that the terminus perfects the being of that which it brings to completion, and even becomes intrinsic to it, but is not further perfected in itself. And so it is also with the divine Word, who terminates his assumed human nature by perfecting it in being and subsistence, even becoming intrinsic to it and subsisting in it, but is himself utterly undiminished and unimproved by the Hypostatic Union that results. Conclusion Based on these observations about the unique character of terminative assumption, it should be clear that to say the Word “became” flesh, as in John 1:14, need not automatically mean the Word himself underwent change in the Incarnation. It is a mistake to conflate becoming and change. This is borne out plainly by Scripture in two non-incarnational “becoming” texts. In Isaiah 63:8 we read of Yahweh, “So He became their Savior.” Arguably, God did not become savior to his people by undergoing a change in himself but by effecting a change in his people and bringing them to himself. Their new relation to him is the reason for saying he “became.” Also, in John 1:3 we read of the Word’s creative operation that, “All things came into being through Him.” The word translated “came into being,” ἐγένετο, is the same word used is in John 1:14 to speak of the Incarnation. But in 1:3 this word cannot mean “change” since creation ex nihilo is not a change. That is, it involves no movement from a terminus a quo to a terminus ad quem—this movement being necessary in any genuine change. This should suffice to show that “become” does not necessarily mean “change.” To become the terminus of a thing only requires newness of being or perfection in that which is terminated, not in that which terminates. It could coincide with newness of being in the terminus, but it would not be on account of terminating as such that the terminus was further actualized. And in the case of the divine Word, given that he is eternal pure act and esse completum, his termination of a human nature cannot coincide with a corresponding change in him. So long as the person of the Word terminates the human nature by assuming it to himself, we are able to meet the requirements of an orthodox doctrine of the Incarnation: the Word The Word's Terminative Assumption of a Human Nature 157 became flesh; he who was in the form of God took to himself the form of a servant; Jesus of Nazareth is true God; and God the Son is true man. Because the manner of the Word’s assumption of a human nature is terminative, there is no alteration—neither subtraction, nor addition—required in his divine nature or person in order for him to subsist in our nature. Unless critics can show that terminative assumption is necessarily false, or somehow fails to constitute a real Incarnation, the Word’s assumption of our nature offers no compelling reason to forsake the strong claims of N&V traditional theism. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 159–178 159 God’s Power and the Impossible: Who Delineates Them? Emmanuel Durand, O.P. University of Fribourg Fribourg, Switzerland From Epicurus to Hume, and from Hume to Hans Jonas, the notion of omnipotence has been periodically called into question, if not dismissed. Contestation or circumvention is found in both theology and philosophy. From a theological perspective, it might sound convenient to distinguish between God’s almightiness, confessed in the Creed, and God’s omnipotence, articulated by philosophers. The Almighty would disclose the ultimate meaning of his power in the Paschal mystery, whereas omnipotence is subjected to a great variety of definitions. The latter should be abandoned to the arena of philosophers and the stalemated arguments undertaken by logicians.1 Moreover, as Origen suggested, almightiness proves to be Trinitarian,2 whereas omnipotence is metaphysical. Excellent contemporary theologians orient, intentionally or not, the theology of God’s almightiness and sovereignty in this direction.3 Within Catholic Tradition, though, true omnipotence should be thought of in a way which can be integrated in the 1 2 3 See Peter T. Geach, “Omnipotence,” Philosophy 48 (1973): 7–20. For a sharp divide between almightiness and omnipotence, see already Duns Scotus, Ordinatio I, d. 42, q. unica. For their comments on an earlier draft of this essay, I warmly thank Michał Paluch, O.P., and Thomas Joseph White, O.P. See Origen, Peri archôn 1.2.10. See, among the very best ones: Jean-Pierre Batut, Pantocrator: “Dieu le Père tout-puissant” dans la théologie prénicéenne (Paris: Institut d’Études Augustiniennes, 2009); Marc Vial, Pour une théologie de la toute-puissance de Dieu: L’approche d’Eberhard Jüngel (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2016); Richard Bauckham, The Theology of the Book of Revelation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 23–65. 160 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. confession of the Almighty. At the same time, the concept of almightiness should not depart from a wisely defined omnipotence. From a philosophical perspective, one might observe—at least in the continental context—a transfer from omnipotence to what might be called the “omni-possible.” From this perspective, the unmastered possibilities of God cannot be submitted to any human concept of power. We literally cannot conceive what God is capable of. God is the only master of the impossible. No conceptually delimited power can hem in the open field of possibilities. Moreover, human reason has neither ground nor right to frame or limit the kind of impossibilities God might be willing to overcome.4 Otherwise, God would be constrained by some idolatrous concept of ours. The impossible should in no way limit God, who surpasses our knowledge of limited capacities. Should we engage in this line of postmodern thinking about the unbound God? In this essay, I will attempt to bring omnipotence and almightiness together. Searching for integration and unity in this field relies on the assumption that reason and faith aim at the very same truth who is God and his wisdom, embodied in both the created order and in the Paschal mystery. Instead of fostering a sharp divide of registers or notional contents between almightiness and omnipotence, I will argue that the very same attribute of the One True God might be approached by both philosophers and theologians, relying on their proper and different instances of judgment. The key to this epistemological argument will be provided by Thomas Aquinas’s analysis of the possible and the impossible, within a theology which remains mindful of God’s power. There are four common, often-overlapping objections to God’s omnipotence. First, omnipotence is arbitrary. If God is omnipotent, his power is infinite, and nothing is compelling within the created order. Anything is possible and the opposite as well, so that a given sequence of events can be replaced at any time by another possible sequence of alternative events. Everything therefore seems to be on hold, without intrinsic value or reliability. The regularity of phenomena, physical laws, ethical norms, and human responsibility are all pending, in the end determined by divine volition. Second, omnipotence is overwhelming, if not self-contradictory. If God is omnipotent, his power is infinite and leaves no room for other powers. 4 See Jean-Luc Marion, “L’impossibilité de l’impossible: Dieu,” Archivio di filosofia 78 (2010): 21–36. Marion does not make any distinction between impossible to nature and impossible per se, merging both in the impossible “for us.” God's Power and the Impossible 161 Nothing can stand against God. Ultimately, nothing should exist outside of him, since he saturates the whole range of possibilities with his power alone. The idea that God would be, at once, omnipotent and Creator would seem to involve a contradiction, insofar as creation implies a real otherness and a proper space of existence.5 Third, an omnipotent God would be guilty. If God is truly omnipotent, he is guilty of the woes and evils he tolerates in this world, at least as soon as they exceed the proportion of what his creatures could bear. An omnipotent God ought to curb evils and hold back plagues, while obviously he does not do so and lets human beings face them to the best of their ability. Most of the time, however, they are submerged and dehumanized.6 Fourth, the idea that God is powerful might well be a pitiful fantasy and a poor projection, set up by males who themselves dream of being all powerful themselves. While we are often powerless, especially while facing our limitations, woes and evils, we dream of being all powerful. However, perversion consists precisely in refusing limitations and want. God then comes into the picture as the maximized projection of archaic representations of power: male, paternal, creative, sovereign, limitless.7 Framing Historically the Issue of Unbound Power In this essay, I would like to address the first objection in particular. I will do so by weaving together statements from the Gospels and metaphysical arguments. However, first I would like to refine the fabric of the objection at hand, giving it more precision. If God’s power is understood in such a way that it has no objective limitation because of its infinity, everything could be, or could become, very different. Realities, events, chains, cycles, orders, laws, norms, values—all this is suspended. As long as God wills them to be as they are, they remain. Yet, God could also will another kind of physical world, a different ethical order, or for that matter, a human history quite unlike our 5 6 7 See Hans Jonas, “The Concept of God after Auschwitz: A Jewish Voice,” The Journal of Religion 67 (1987): 1–13. See David Hume, Dialogue concerning Natural Religion, bk. 10, in Dialogues concerning Natural Religion and Other Writings (1779), ed. Dorothy Coleman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 97–92. See: Charles Hartshorne, Omnipotence and Other Theological Mistakes (Albany: State University of New York, 1984), 6–26; Jean Ansaldi, “La toute-puissance du Dieu du théisme dans le champ de la perversion,” Laval théologique et philosophique 47 (1991): 3–11; André Wénin, “Au-delà des représentations, Dieu,” in Dieu à l’ épreuve de notre cri, ed. Adolphe Gesché and Paul Scolas (Paris: Cerf, 1999), 25–44. 162 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. own. At any moment, another sequence of events, causes and effects, could replace the usual world that we experience. As a consequence, regularity of phenomena, physical laws, ethical norms, and human responsibility rest on borrowed time." This kind of omnipotence shares a great deal with the infamous potentia absoluta of late Scholasticism, the unbound power of God. Until the late Scholastic period, the distinction between potentia absoluta and potentia ordinata, unbound power and ordained power, was considered a purely rational experiment. Wisely, Aquinas states that the order inscribed by God in creation never equals the fullness of his wisdom and justice, identical to his very essence in divine simplicity. However ordered the works of God may be, the divine goodness always exceeds the proportion of the created order. This leaves room theoretically for other possible orders in the course of things, apart from contradictions.8 For Aquinas, the distinction between unbound power and ordered power is merely a distinction of reason, not a real one. Ordered power is the only one actually implemented by God according to his benevolent designs. As a rational experiment, though, one might abstract power from other divine attributes. In that case, unbound power extends to everything that ultimately coheres with the notion of being (ratio entis), thus excluding only that which is contradictory. However, Duns Scotus turned the thought experiment into a real distinction.9 For him, the unbound power of God might, at any time, breach through and make an exception in the usual implementation of his ordinary power, as well as all mediation by secondary causes. This huge difference between Scotus and Aquinas in regard to the divine power stems from a significant epistemological divide which separates the two thinkers. Whereas Aquinas holds convergence between faith and reason in respect to the very same objects, Scotus states that faith and reason 8 9 See Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae [ST] I, q. 25, a. 5; De potentia, q. 1, a. 5. See: Eugenio Randi, “Potentia Dei conditionata: Una questiona di Hugo di SaintCher sull’onnipotenza divina” (Sent. I, 42, q. 1),” Rivista di storia della filosofia 39 (1984): 521–36; Randi, “A Scotist Way of Distinguishing between God’s Absolute and Ordained Power,” Studies in Church History Subsidia 5 (1987): 43–50; William J. Courtenay, Capacity and Volition: A History of the Distinction of Absolute and Ordained Power (Bergamo: P. Lubrina, 1990); Courtenay, “The Dialectic of Omnipotence in the High and Late Middle Ages,” in Divine Omniscience and Omnipotence in Medieval Philosophy: Islamic, Jewish and Christian Perspectives, ed. Tamar Rudavsky (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1985), 243–69. God's Power and the Impossible 163 cannot reach at the same objects. This deficiency applies to the case of the divine power.10 For Scotus, divine omnipotence cannot be demonstrated by reason, for it is an object of faith, attested by the first article of the Creed. Rational demonstrations do not deal with omnipotence as a divine attribute, but rather with infinite power. This kind of power has been known of by philosophers, such as Aristotle, Avicenna, and Averroes. They reached at the First Cause that moves all things through secondary causes. Infinite power might be rigorously inferred from the secondary causes that metaphysically depend on the First Cause. As revealed to faith, the divine omnipotence differs essentially from the infinite power of the First Cause, because it is not tied to secondary causes. God does not need anything to accomplish what he wants. He is not subjected to any order of secondary causes he pre-established. At will, God can bypass worldly causes, suspend them or modify their natural order. Divine omnipotence therefore is the same as the unbound freedom of God. God should not be limited by any of the laws he has established in creation. Within the overall context of Scotus’s thought, this is connected to the assumption that every free agent might, at the very moment it does something specific, do the opposite. Such freedom ultimately is that of God’s unbound power, considered here as a kind of alternative manner of operating. With a slightly different terminology, we have returned to our initial problem. As an object of faith, God’s almightiness is drawn from God’s mighty deeds in salvation history. It cannot be demonstrated or qualified by natural reason, whereas omnipotence—as infinite power—should be investigated by or abandoned to philosophers. With this challenge in mind, I would like to move back to the way Christ speaks of power, possibility, and impossibility in the Gospels. Taking into account these statements in a sound theology will require some metaphysical awareness. God’s Power in the New Testament I am not going to solve any exegetical issue in this essay, but I would like to make clear that New Testament statements concerning God’s power often call for basic metaphysical clarifications and decisions. When these options are not made explicit, they are nevertheless operating within interpretations, though beyond awareness. A very famous illustration has been provided by Rudolf Bultmann’s theology of divine action and miracles. 10 Compare Aquinas, ST I, q. 25, a. 5, ad 1, and Duns Scotus, Ordinatio I, d. 42, q. unica. See La puissance et son ombre: De Pierre Lombard et Luther, ed. Olivier Boulnois (Paris: Aubier, 1994), 53–65 and 263–67. 164 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. His vision presupposed a clear discontinuity between the field of human affairs, open to God’s action, and the field of nature, closed to such action.11 This disjunction implies two metaphysical assumptions: (1) Nature is a closed and deterministic system; (2) Physical, non-contingent causation and God’s action are incompatible. Therefore, God cannot act within nature, though he might be involved in the existential self-understanding of human subjects. Unfortunately for Bultmann, at least one of these metaphysical assumptions proves to be wrong. In both physics and metaphysics, causation is increasingly coming to be acknowledged as occurring in a contingent manner. The second assumption should be discussed as well, but it would take too long. Of course, Bultmann’s metaphysical assumptions were not his main motives for proposing an existential theory of divine action, but this facet of his argument falls apart once it is made explicit. In a similar way, by the end of this essay, I would like to provide one key of discernment in respect to unbound readings of Luke 1:35: “Nothing is impossible to God.” God’s power is testified or confessed in manifold ways in the New Testament. First, in the Pauline epistles, the overcoming of the usual mundane hierarchy of power and weakness is strongly stated by Paul, who speaks eloquently of the inversion of all worldly powers through the Cross. Unexpectedly, God’s power has been demonstrated and exalted through the ultimate weakness of Christ. Whereas all human power seemed totally exhausted in the Crucified One, he was nevertheless fulfilling the ultimate goal of his mission. This paradoxical event spoke not only of Christ alone, but also, through him, of God’s unique way of salvation (1 Cor 1:23–25). The same paradox is at work in Paul’s preaching, which is entirely derived from the Cross, as well as in his governance of the turbulent community in Corinth (1 Cor 2:2–5; 2 Cor 12:9–10; 13:2–4, 9). Second, in the Synoptic Gospels, God’s power is said to be the unique capacity of his for specific actions, such as forgiving sins (Mark 2:7; Luke 5:21), raising up children for Abraham (Matt 3:9; Luke 3:8), destroying both soul and body (Matt 10:28; Luke 12:5), and healing the sick miraculously (Luke 5:17). Some of these divine actions can be performed through human actions, as the last one is throughout Jesus’s ministry. In contrast, the Gospel according to John does not qualify the power that God has of doing so and so. Instead, this Gospel underscores many 11 See: Rudolf Bultmann, “New Testament and Mythology,” in Kerygma and Myth: A Theological Debate, ed. Hans W. Bartsch (London: SCPK, 1953), 1–44; Ian G. Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science: The Gifford Lectures 1989–1991 (London: SCM Press, 1990), 254–56. God's Power and the Impossible 165 actions that human beings could never accomplish unless they were helped by God or Christ: perform signs, enter the kingdom, believe in Jesus, receive the Spirit, and indeed, do anything.12 In this way, God’s gracious power is also indicated through all kinds of incapacities of human beings regarding the supernatural realm. Third, power (dynamis) is employed at times as a proper name or attribute of God. The Angel designates the Spirit as “the Power of the Most High” when announcing to Mary Jesus’s conception (Luke 1:35). The Virgin praises God as “the Powerful” (ho dynatos) in the Magnificat (Luke 1:49). Jesus himself, arguing with the Sadducees about the resurrection of the dead, denounces their inability to know Scriptures as well as God’s power (Mark 12:24; Matt 22:29). During his trial, Jesus responds to the high priest that the Son of Man will be seen sitting at the right hand of “the Power” (Mark 14:62; Matt 22:29). These designations are also numerous in the Book of Revelation, by means either of the attribute dynamis or of the title pantocrator.13 Just by paying attention to the semantic field of power in the New Testament, one can acquire some biblical sense of God’s ordered power in the economy of salvation, revealing God’s identity, his soteriological initiatives and aims, as well as his means: forgiving, healing, performing signs, provoking faith, empowering little ones, and so on. Fourthly, another mode of attestation of God’s power is found in the synoptic Gospels: statements about the possible and the impossible. These retain our attention and call for further scrutiny. The subject for whom something is said to be possible or impossible might be: (1) God, (2) Abba/ Father, or (3) those who believe. Following the Synoptic Gospels (here in Douai-Rheims version,14 emphases added), we can highlight four statements within dialogues and one prayer. 12 13 14 See John 3:2–5; 5:44; 6:44, 65; 7:34–36; 8:21–22.43; 9:16; 12:39; 13:33, 36–37; 14:17; 15:5; 16:12. Pantocrator and pantrocratoria express in a definite manner the lordship or sovereignty of God and Christ over creation and history; see Rev. 1:8; 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7, 14; 19:6, 15; 21:22. In this section, I use this old English translation of a Latin version of the Bible because its Latin original remains very close to the texts Aquinas made use of. Most of the time, Aquinas did not read Luke 1:35 in the same way we usually do in modern translations of the Greek New Testament. 166 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. The Angel to Mary at the Annunciation And behold thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived a son in her old age: and this is the sixth month with her that is called barren. Because no word shall be impossible with God. (Luke 1:36–37) To the father of a possessed boy If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. (Mark 9:23) To the disciples unable to help the father For, amen I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain: Remove from hence hither, and it shall remove: and nothing shall be impossible to you. (Matt 17:20) Regarding how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God [The disciples] wondered the more, saying among themselves: Who then can be saved? And Jesus looking on them, saith with men it is impossible; but not with God. For all things are possible with God. (Mark 10:26–27; Matt 19:25–26; Luke 18:27) Jesus praying at Gethsemane And when he was gone forward a little, he fell flat on the ground: and he prayed that, if it might be, the hour might pass from him. And he saith: Abba, Father, all things are possible to thee: remove this chalice from me; but not what I will, but what thou wilt. (Mark 14:35–36; Matt 26:39) According to the Angel, God’s word stands as some promise which goes beyond what human beings would consider possible. God’s power overcomes the barrenness of the post-menopausal Elizabeth, accomplishing something that is impossible for nature, according to the normal limitations of human procreation. In Jesus’s own words, “everything is possible” or “nothing is impossible,” not only to the power of God, but also to whoever believes. It is such a challenge for a father who experienced his son’s possession (and/or epilepsy) from childhood to believe without restriction that Jesus might free the boy from this affliction. This exceeds the disciples’ own ability to sufficiently have the boundless faith needed to intercede efficaciously and God's Power and the Impossible 167 drive out the spirit. Still, wholehearted faith would make everything possible when the disciples face insurmountable obstacles with God, relying entirely through faith on God’s own might.15 Eventually, facing an extreme anguish for death at Gethsemane, Jesus himself expresses directly to God his own confidence in God’s saving power. Crying out to God, Christ’s words are, nonetheless, marked with a kind of ambivalence. “Everything is possible for you” is highly true, but in this specific setting, it entails an ultimate temptation for Jesus himself: “Take this cup from me.” Jesus resists this temptation and opposes it with his final consent: “Yet not what I will, but what you will.” In this context, Jesus’s statements are not theoretically detached. They might have a significant theoretical load to be unpacked. However, they are always vitally connected to ultimate challenges for human resources and confidence. As we consider the narrative setting of these statements, they are not to be dealt with as unrestricted theoretical propositions. Nevertheless, some metaphysical distinctions prove very useful for interpreting the Angel’s and Jesus’s words with care and seriousness. At the least, such distinctions avoid misreading the Gospel and, in this way, help to strengthen our faith. Registers and Meanings of Power Dealing with power in the Scriptum on Lombard’s Sentences, Thomas Aquinas starts from the usual meaning of power in common language, most often drawn from the field of human action (ethical or political), then moves to the physical order, and from there, abstracts a metaphysical concept of power. This concept is then enhanced and fully developed for a theological use.16 I suggest that we follow a similar path. In common language, one might distinguish three principal senses of power: • Impact and influence in the political order; • Force and intensity within the physical realm; • Charisma or ability to subjugate others. Charismatic power over others is a very human phenomenon, often abusive 15 16 A classical distinction between dogmatic faith and faith as a charism might be helpful here, in line with Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, lecture 5, nos. 10–11. Miracles could not be secured by theological faith; they often depend on a charism of faith, granted to a few believers for the edification of all. See Aquinas, In I sent. I, d. 42, q. 1, a. 1, resp. 168 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. and male. God might make use of this occasionally in specific biblical narratives, but these ambiguous traits should not define God’s power. Both political and physical power hardly befit God, as they imply some counterforces and resistances. The more extensive political influence becomes, the more independent counterpowers are needed. With greater intensity in a given physical force, an equally intense opposite force is needed in response. Envisaging God’s power along these lines would be highly misleading. God would be one more intra-worldly power, albeit the highest. If this were so, God would essentially be involved in a power balance with other physical forces or political powers. These essential limitations of the common concepts of power call for a metaphysical discernment. For the sake of theology, starting from the physical and the political experiences of power, we need to consider power in a much more refined way. We should abstract power from any specific field of action. Such a thought experiment is metaphysical in nature: we have to investigate how and why power is related to being as being, not to being as physical, being as political, being as male, and so on. To perform such an essential reduction of power to its metaphysical lineaments results in a demythologization process. This is much needed to avoid anthropomorphic projections and caricatures of God’s power, which lead to rejection, disbelief, and atheism. Finally, one should remember here that God’s act of power as Creator has the gift of being (esse) as its terminus. Therefore, it is utterly distinct from every intra-worldly creature-to-creature or human-to-human power, and cannot be adequately mirrored by them, except metaphorically or analogically at great remove and dissimilitude. God’s act of power gives being to things. Consequently, far from acting over against the autonomy or flourishing of the creature, it is the foundation of that autonomy and flourishing. This also entails that God is usually hidden in his power since his power enables things to “appear” in their own integrity as gift. This outlook not only provides a kind of demythologization but also enables us to purify intra-worldly idolatries concerning power structures which we might take as being absolute.17 Commenting on Aristotle’s Metaphysics 5, Thomas Aquinas explicates four meanings of power.18 Two of them are relevant for our investigation: 17 18 I thank my friend Thomas Joseph White for having suggested this avenue of thought. See Aquinas, In V metaphys., lect. 14 (ch. 5), ed. Marietti, no. 954–60. In Aristotle’s Metaphysics, this first semantic approach will be eventually completed by the demonstration of the priority of act over potency, in Metaphysics 9.8.1049b4f. God's Power and the Impossible 169 • Active power: principle of moving or changing something or someone else as other. This is the power to act upon something else. • Passive power: capacity of being moved or changed by something or someone else as other. This is the power of receiving something else. Active and passive powers result from a simple analysis of action and passion. For instance, in order to learn a new language, someone uses his or her active power of studying with intensity and assiduity. But this would be beneficial and transformative only because the very same person possesses also the passive power of receiving new sounds, being taught, memorizing, and learning. The second meaning of power—the passive one—is often forgotten in common language as well as in the day-to-day language of theology in pedagogical and more popular settings. This leads to tremendous misrepresentations of the relation between God’s power and creatures. Before standing before God’s power with any active power, creatures more radically face God with a passive power.19 This is not a power to resist passively, but a capacity for being moved, drawn, called, and so on. Availability to be moved or changed by God is far more radical in every creature than the power to resist or collaborate with God. The Active Subject of Power and the Limits of Impossible Objects We shall now envisage God’s power through two complementary lenses: • Considering the active subject, God, who exercises power; • Focusing on the object to which God’s power might apply.20 Being pure act, God is active power with no mingling of passive power. God does not move from potency to act. He is not changed, for better or worse, according to a passive power. God’s active power is pure and premier, perfect and complete. When attributed to God, the notion of power retains only the notion of being the essential principle for acting as God. The 19 20 This distinction was totally missing in Jonas, “Concept of God after Auschwitz,” 9. For a Christian dialectical treatment of very similar aporia, see Augustine of Hippo, De ordine 2.17.46; Lactantius, De ira Dei 13.20–21 (recalling the argument of Epicurus); Serge-Thomas Bonino, “L’incompréhensible sagesse de Dieu dans l’Expositio super Iob,” in Études Thomasiennes (Paris: Parole et Silence, 2018), 593–624. See Aquinas, In I sent., d. 42, q. 2, a. 2, resp. 170 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. common notion of power is pruned of any distant completion by an activity to be achieved.21 There is no real distinction between God’s power and God’s activity. The real distinction is found between the created effects of God’s activity and the uncreated power of God. We should also notice that God’s active power is not granted by anyone else and not received from another. God is his very power, as well as his very essence. Consequently, God’s power is not limited by any mode of reception in some subject, as is the case for human power. God’s power is infinite in this respect.22 Still, there is some limitation of God’s active power, which stems from its perfection. As a consequence of God being pure act, any defective power should be removed from our thinking of God. In this respect, God cannot sin, for instance, because sin is a defect of the will. In a similar way, God cannot lie, as a lie is a failure in telling the truth; God cannot be tired or forget, and so on.23 The objects of God’s power might be assessed as possible or impossible according to different frames, scales, or referents. The objective limitation to God’s power is set by that which is per se impossible. Any concept that equates what is with what is not proposes this kind of radical impossibility. A square circle is impossible per se. A man with no soul is similarly self-contradictory. That some past event or some past action would have not occurred is impossible per se. The impossible per se, being self-contradictory, does not highlight a limitation of God’s active power, but entails a simple negation of the very essence of the possible. God cannot do such impossible things—not because of some intrinsic limitation placed upon his power, but rather because of the absence of any possible object. We shall return to this point below. We must take into account both the actual perfection of God’s power and its objects (possible or impossible per se). This provides a safeguard against the representation of God’s power as unlimited. Focusing only on the infinity of God’s active power would lead to an excessive or delirious depiction of God’s might, one that would ultimately do great damage to true Christian faith. Who Delineates the Impossible? In his disputed question De potentia, q. 1, a. 3, Thomas Aquinas spells out various senses of the possible and the impossible, with some reference to 21 22 23 See Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 1, resp.; Summa contra gentiles [SCG] II, chs. 8–10. See Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 2, resp. See Aquinas, In I sent. I, d. 42, q. 2, a. 2, resp. For a developed and articulated list of many things that the omnipotent God cannot do, see SCG II, ch. 25. God's Power and the Impossible 171 Aristotle’s Metaphysics 5.12. This analysis unpacks two main categories: • Possible and impossible in respect to some potency, active or passive: o Impossible because of some defect of the active power • o Impossible because of some impediment external to the power • • Example: for a man to fly like a bird Example: for a man to see through a wall Possible or impossible in respect to being, whatever the power might be o Impossible by itself (per se), because of some contradiction Aquinas argues that that which is per se impossible, entailing some contradiction, cannot be the object of any action, whatever might be the power in question and whoever might be the agent. The irreducible difference between affirmation and negation is used as the most obvious case depicting at once all contradictions of terms. The assumption is that the principle of non-contradiction between affirmation and negation (regarding the same formal object) is the very first principle of all human discourse and reasoning, without which no rational speech would stand. Further, more particular contradictions can be referred to the paramount one: the mutual exclusion between being and nonbeing.24 In this way, Aquinas proceeds to a kind of reduction of every contradiction to that which is per se impossible. The two categories of impossibility, spelled out above, can be labeled as (1) that which is impossible to nature—which is twofold, namely, by defect or by hindrance—and (2) that which is per se impossible. Relying on this clarification, Aquinas draws proper theological statements, first regarding that which is per se impossible: Those things, then, which are impossible to nature in the first or second way are possible to God: because, since his power is infinite, 24 See Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 3, resp. (referring to Aristotle, Metaphysics 4.3.1005b18). We follow the translation made by the English Dominican Fathers (Westminster, MD: Newman Press, 1952 [originally 1932]). Some support the view that Aquinas’s understanding of the possible is eventually disconnected from any potency; see Kristell Trego, L’ impuissance du possible: Émergence et développement du possible, d’Aristote à l’aube des temps modernes (Paris: Vrin, 2019), 231–37. 172 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. it is subject to no defect, nor is there any matter that he cannot transform at will, since his power is irresistible. On the other hand those things which involve the third kind of impossibility God cannot do, since he is supreme act and sovereign being: wherefore his action cannot terminate otherwise than principally in being, and secondarily in nonbeing. Consequently he cannot make yes and no to be true at the same time, nor any of those things which involve such an impossibility. Nor is he said to be unable to do these things through lack of power, but through lack of possibility, such things being intrinsically impossible: and this is what is meant by those who say that ‘God can do it, but it cannot be done.’25 For Aquinas, “all things are possible to God” does not apply to that which is per se impossible, which never meets the sound notion of possibility. May we focus on that which is impossible to nature? Should what remains impossible to a specific nature become possible to God? Does this mean that God would then act against the very nature that he has created and set in some definite order? To overcome these aporia, one must acknowledge that every creature has a radical passive power to be moved by God, even beyond all its natural active and passive powers. This radical passive power is labeled “obediential” potency. Aquinas argues for this deeper level of consideration while responding to an objection drawn from a gloss to Romans 9:24: “If thou were cut out of the wild olive tree, which is natural to thee; and, contrary to nature, were grafted into the good olive tree” (Douai-Rheims). The gloss soundly states that “since God is the author of nature he cannot do what is contrary to nature.” Shall we equate what is impossible to nature and what is contrary to nature? Should we conclude that God cannot do what is impossible to nature? Aquinas gets out of this trap by articulating a key distinction: Augustine’s words quoted in the gloss mean, not that God is unable to do otherwise than nature does, since his works are often contrary to the wonted course of nature [contra consuetum cursum naturae]; but that whatever he does in things is not contrary to nature, but is nature in them, forasmuch as he is the author and governor of nature [conditor et ordinator naturae]. Thus in the physical order we observe that when an inferior body is moved by a higher, the movement is natural to it, although it may not seem in keeping with the movement which it has by reason of its own nature: thus the tidal 25 Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 3, resp. God's Power and the Impossible 173 movement of the sea is caused by the moon; and this movement is natural to it as the Commentator observes [De coelo et mundo 3, comm. 20], although water of itself has naturally a downward movement. Thus in all creatures, what God does in them is quasi-natural to them [omnes creaturae quasi pro naturali habent quod a Deo in eis fit]. Wherefore we distinguish in them a twofold potentiality: a natural potentiality in respect of their proper operations and movements, and another, which we call obediential, in respect of what is done in them by God.26 The example of the tide is easy to grasp. As an effect of gravity, the natural power of water is to flow downward. Nevertheless, as an effect on the moon, the sea periodically moves up and down, contrary to the natural power of water. Such a move of flux and reflux is not really against nature, though, as the moon is a higher (celestial) cause by which water by its very nature can be moved. The availability of the sea to be moved by the moon is analogous to the obediential potency of every creature to be moved by God, beyond its natural power. Today, one might object to this specific example that both the earth and the moon belong to the same order of causality and both influence the sea thanks to the same law of attraction by gravity. A simpler example could be the skills of a dog. A good one might sniff truffles. This belongs to his natural power. Once the same dog is properly trained by a police dog handler, it might sniff drugs and help identifying criminals. This results from a higher cause, the training by an officer, but the dog has the obediential potency to be elevated to this kind of skills. We could choose another example, like some healing process. An epileptic boy might be healed by the natural virtue of his own body and soul, by the right medication appointed by a good physician, and by the attentive care and affection of his parents and close friends. These are proximate causes of a restored good health. At least in the ancient world, the very same disease might be connected with higher causes or disturbances (like the bad spirit of Mark 9:14–29). In any case, higher causes might be involved in the healing of the boy, like petitionary prayers and, ultimately, God’s very action. These kinds of causes belong to a different order than proximate causes and would operate without competing with the latter. The boy has the natural power of healing himself thanks to the help of proximate causes, but he also has some obediential potency to be healed—God willing—thanks to petitionary prayers, in conjunction with God’s saving power. 26 Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 3, ad 1; see Aquinas, Super Rom 9, lec. 24 (no. 910). 174 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. Consequently, if we take into account the higher causes, that which is impossible for a specific natural active or passive power is not entirely impossible, for two main reasons: • first, the active power of God is infinite on the side of God; • second, every creature stands in obediential potency toward God. Just by being created, every creature is fully available to God’s power; and this is more deeply rooted in this being’s creaturely condition than are any of its particular active or passive powers. May we leave aside that which is per se impossible, which is excluded from the very notion of possibility? Who should state what is possible and what is impossible for some power? How can one distinguish what is possible and impossible for a nature? What sort of frame of reference should guide such discernment? I suspect that the Cartesian dormant in many of us would immediately respond: God is the only One to judge the possible and the impossible, as he is the master of the impossible.27 Aquinas’s response to these questions proves astonishing, though in the end, it presents a case of his characteristic way of integrating commonsense reason into Christian theology. Thomas proposes a double consideration: on the side of those who judge and on the side of what is judged. Dealing with the former, Aquinas summons philosophy and theology as two different wisdoms: Wisdom is twofold: mundane wisdom called philosophy, which considers the lower causes, causes namely that are themselves caused, and bases its judgements on them; and divine wisdom or theology, which considers the higher, that is the divine, causes and judges according to them. Now the higher causes are the divine attributes, such as the wisdom, goodness, will of God, and the like.28 The example of some disease, provided by Aquinas, is relevant. An illness should be diagnosed according to its proximate causes. This falls to the skills of the physician. Nevertheless, the very same illness might also be assessed by taking into account remote causes, like a disturbing astral conjunction for instance. Discerning such an astral pattern pertains to 27 28 See Jean-Luc Marion, “L’impossibilité de l’impossible: Dieu,” 21–36. Regarding the background of this line of thought, see La puissance et son ombre, ed. Olivier Boulnois, 40–45, including key references to Ockham, Montaigne, and Descartes. Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 4, resp. God's Power and the Impossible 175 the skills of the astronomer. In this way, insomnia might be referred to a digestive trouble by the physician and to a full moon by the astronomer. Philosophy and theology relate to one another in a similar way as medicine and astronomy. Philosophy and theology have their specific frames of reference and scopes. For effects that might stem from both inferior causes and superior causes, both wisdoms can work to discern what is possible and what is impossible according to their specific lenses of investigation. However, effects that could proceed only from superior causes are out of reach for the judgment of philosophy. Let us now consider what is to be judged. The possible and the impossible should be assessed, first of all, in relation to the proximate causes of phenomena, and not in relation to superior and remote causes thereof. Such an analysis is required as a priority, because effects must be labeled as being possible or impossible in relation of their proximate causes. Otherwise, there would be no common meaning and no basic agreement concerning what is possible and what is impossible. In the same way, Aquinas remarks elsewhere that to discern necessity and contingency in this world should be done by reference to proximate causes.29 An initial assessment of the possible and the impossible pertains to philosophy, properly speaking. It requires an etiological investigation of proximate causes, as it is done through a medical diagnosis. In the case of theology, however, two kinds of judgment might be registered concerning these matters. First of all, theology discloses the involvement of superior causes in the very effectuation of inferior causalities. What is possible for nature does not merely come forth from proximate causes alone. It depends also on higher causes and, first and foremost, on the only and ultimate First Cause, who is God as Creator of all creatures and governor of all created effects or activities.30 Secondly, theology might explain how natural limits (in relation to proximate causes) are exceeded, by pointing to the active power of God and at the obediential potency of all creatures in relation to God. 29 30 See Aquinas, SCG III, ch. 72 (no. 2); ST I, q. 25, a. 3, ad 4; Guy Jalbert, Nécessité et contingence chez Saint Thomas et chez ses prédécesseurs (Ottawa: University Press, 1962), 133–64. Theology also highlights how secondary causalities interplay in such a way that God’s will might be implemented, notwithstanding the usual course of nature or the predictable outcome of events; see Aquinas, SCG III, ch. 96 (no. 8); ST II-II, q. 83, a. 2, resp.; see also Augustine of Hippo, De civitate Dei 10.12. 176 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. Relying on these qualifications of philosophy and theology, Thomas can make a sound argument: All things are possible to God. Therefore, if we must judge of a thing’s possibility or impossibility in reference to him, nothing will be impossible: and this is not fitting [inconveniens]. The theologian would say that whatever is not impossible in itself is possible to God; according to Mark 9:22: All things are possible to him that believeth, and Luke 1:37: No word shall be impossible with God.31 The specific assessment provided by theology widens the scope of the possible, going beyond what is impossible to nature. Still, that which is per se impossible does not cohere with any notion of the possible, even theologically speaking. In order to decisively settle on a common and understandable language regarding the possible and the impossible, philosophy’s own judgment is required. Judging according to God, theology goes far beyond the reach of philosophy, but the theologian cannot deal with the common and proper meanings of the terms “possible” and “impossible,” even in Gospel statements, without philosophical judgment on realities involved according to proximate causes. We rightly should hope that, in many matters at hand, philosophical judgment is not so different from the shared discernment provided by common sense and practical sciences. Eventually, Thomas dismisses three explanations of God’s omnipotence which were common in his own time, explanations which focused on secondary aspects of this reality, thereby missing the very notion (ratio) of omnipotence: • Focusing on the cause: God is omnipotent because he has an infinite power. • Focusing on the perfection: God is omnipotent because he cannot endure any defect. • Focusing on the mode of possession: God is omnipotent because he can do whatever he wills. Accordingly, Aquinas states that the very ratio of omnipotence is to be found in the unique relation of God’s power to everything that is truly possible: 31 Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 4, sc 4, and response to sc 4 (trans. slightly adjusted). God's Power and the Impossible 177 God’s power, considered in itself, extends to all such objects as do not imply a contradiction. . . . As regards things that imply a contradiction, they are impossible to God as being impossible in themselves. Consequently God’s power extends to things that are possible in themselves: and such are the things that do not involve a contradiction. Therefore it is evident that God is called almighty because he can do all things that are possible in themselves.32 This sober and minimalist statement proves crucial for a sound theology. God should not be qualified or aimed at as the One who might overcome every impossibility without any restriction, since some of them are just non-sense, insofar as they entail contradiction. Leaving that which is per se impossible out of reach even for God’s power does not mean that we, poor human beings, limit God by our own judgment or enclose him in some conceptual idol of our own. Aquinas’s sound judgment on God’s omnipotence relies on his fundamental confidence that there is some coherence or analogy between (1) God the Almighty, Creator of all that is, (2) the created order of (actual and potential) beings, and (3) the ability of the created human intellect to discern contradictions and to know God, thanks to his works and his Word. Back to the Scriptures Let us not turn back to the New Testament. Following Aquinas, the words “all things are possible” and “no word is impossible” presuppose the obediential potency which lies at the depths of every created being, still however, excluding that which is per se impossible. A sound theology should interpret these statements as meaning even things impossible to nature are possible to God and no word is impossible, except those entailing contradiction. That which is impossible for nature is not only possible for God, but also for the one who believes. Why? Because the act of faith connects the believer directly to God’s power. That which becomes possible to the one who believes depends radically on God’s power, as when a delegate servant implements in a specific matter the power of a king.33 This is fully articulated in Aquinas’s theology of petitionary prayer, as one of the most powerful forms of human cooperation with the implementation of God’s will, despite the frailty of petition in terms of worldly efficacy.34 32 33 34 Aquinas, De potentia, q. 1, a. 7, resp. See Aquinas, Super Matt 17, lec. 20 (no. 1471). See Emmanuel Durand, “The Gospel of Prayer and Theories of Providence,” The Thomist 78 (2014): 519–36. 178 Emmanuel Durand, O.P. Our reading of Aquinas has attempted to bring together Gospels’ statements concerning the possible/impossible and a sound metaphysical discernment, which should respect some objective structure within a coherent network: (1) what is impossible to nature; (2) why God can go beyond it, as Creator; (3) though, without bypassing structural contradictions. We should avoid positing an undetermined sovereignty of God over every kind of impossibility, including contradictions, unless we wish to leap into irrationality rather than faith. We might even go two steps further. Neither philosophers nor theologians should claim to specify what God could do or should do beyond the order of natural potencies. Nevertheless, some metaphysicians might agree that God is wise, good, all-knowing, and omnipotent in such a way that these attributes are compatible and co-terminate in God’s simplicity of essence. One should keep in mind, though, that in the De potentia, Aquinas attributes to theologians—not to philosophers—the ability to judge the possible and the impossible in accord with the divine attributes. Such a statement should be accompanied by the acknowledgment that human beings are not capable of mastering this compatibility by reason in every historical or existential context. Faced with overwhelming evils and woes, many do not see the compatibility of classical divine attributes. They prefer to dismiss omnipotence and/or to hold some post-metaphysical apophatism. I have still argued that God’s ordered power, his potentia ordinata, is not a conceptual idol. Theologians should go further, however, acknowledging that God’s ordered power is entailed by Christ’s preaching and deeds. Theological knowledge of God’s action is not merely conjectural, but instead draws directly from revelation. In many and various ways, the Scriptures profess and interpret what God enacted or brought to completion above the mere order of nature. The Scriptures are not interested in framing all that God might have hypothetically done. Theology might proceed further thanks to the analogy of faith. The Scriptures are first of all fulfilled in Christ’s preaching, actions, passions, death, and resurrection. However, they also might be accomplished in the life and ordeals, faith and hopes, self-surrender and holy death of humble believers, who cling to Christ and receive his Spirit, the very same One who inspired Scripture. In this way, Scripture supports our faith and confidence in the wisdom and power implemented by God through his providence, despite the obscurities of reason and the N&V darkness of faith. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 179–204 179 Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas Anthony T. Flood North Dakota State University Fargo, ND St. Thomas Aquinas distinguishes between the passions of the soul (passiones animae) and the affections (affectiones).1 The passions are appetites that belong to the sensitive part of the soul and depend upon sensory apprehension. The affections belong to the rational part, as rooted in the will as rational appetite. Both the passions and affections involve conscious experiences, and both have positive roles to play in the life of virtue and pursuit of sanctified perfection. However, the affections precede the passions in the order of perfection and are to be found in the angels and God, while the sensitive passions are not. In this essay, I will argue that a further distinguishing mark of the affections versus the passions is that the former have a direct connection to what Aquinas terms “virtual” ordering of acts to ends. The passions have only an indirect connection to virtual ordering, as mediated by the affections themselves. The role of virtual ordering to the affections finds its fullest expression in a person’s friendship with God. While there is some direct textual evidence in Aquinas to support this argument, I recognize it is not conclusive. Nonetheless, I contend it is an interpretation consistent with and suggested by the key aspects that he does fully lay out. I will begin with an overview of Aquinas’s account of the sensitive appetites in terms of both his key texts and the current scholarship addressing them. From there, I will address Aquinas’s notions of the will, love, union, and the affections. I will then turn to the order of the affections and their place in the context of the fullest expression of love found in friendship. The next section will turn to the notion of virtual ordering, particularly as 1 I thank Thomas Osborne for comments on an earlier draft of this essay. 180 Anthony T. Flood informed by the work of Thomas Osborne and Steven Jensen. The final section will defend and illustrate how virtual ordering relates to the affections through the examples of penitential sorrow and joy as found in the friendship with God as established by the virtue of charity. The Passions2 Aquinas’s hylomorphic anthropology views the human person as a unity composed of corporeal and incorporeal aspects. The first category of feeling states he treats are the bodily passions (passiones corporalis), inclusive of itches, cramps, and the like.3 Bodily passions do not involve sensory apprehension. In contrast, sensory apprehension provides the foundation for the passions of the soul, the passiones animae. These latter passions depend upon and are responses to the apprehension of some sense good or evil.4 Nicholas Lombardo notes that intentionality makes the difference between a bodily urge and a passion of the soul. “The dependence of the 2 3 4 There have been several monographs written on Aquinas’s view of the passions and affections in the last several years, all of which defend an interpretation of Aquinas inclusive of a robust affirmation of them as central to human nature. See: Diana Fritz Cates, Aquinas on the Emotions: A Religious-Ethical Inquiry (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2009); Paul Gondreau. The Passions of Christ’s Soul in the Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (Scranton, PA: University of Scranton Press, 2009); Nicholas Kahm, Aquinas: On Emotion’s Participation in Reason (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2019); Nicholas E. Lombardo, O.P., The Logic of Desire: Aquinas on Emotion (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2011); Robert Miner, Thomas Aquinas on the Passions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009); Robert Pasnau, Thomas Aquinas on Human Nature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002); Servais Pinckaers, O.P., Passions and Virtue, trans. Benedict M. Guevin, O.S.B., foreword by Michael Sherwin, O.P. (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2015). “In his earlier writings, such as De Veritate q. 26, Aquinas distinguishes between passions of the body (passiones corporalis) and the passions of the soul (passiones animalis). Simply put, the passions of the body begin in the body and end the soul, while the passions of the soul begin in the soul and end in the body” (Lombardo, Logic of Desire, 45). Aquinas quotes Damascene in defense of his view: “Passion is a movement of the sensitive appetite when we imagine good or evil: in other words, passion is a movement of the irrational soul, when we think of good or evil” (Summa theologiae [ST] I-II, q. 22, a. 3, sc; trans. Fr. Laurence Shapcote, O.P., ed. John Mortensen and Enrique Alarcon [Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012]). Peter King notes, “Aquinas’s account of the nature of the passions rules out classifying ‘objectless’ psychological experiences as passions: nonspecific emotions such as angst or dread on the one hand, and moods on the other hand” (“Aquinas on the Passions,” in Aquinas’s Moral Theory: Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 181 passions on the apprehension of intentions means that the passions themselves are intentional.”5 Of note, sensory apprehension includes things such as memory, imagination, and the cogitative power, all of which expand passionate responses beyond the apprehension of a given sensible object in real time.6 The passions of the soul (simply “passions” from this point forward) or “animate emotions” 7 are experienced in the incorporeal aspects of the person but also necessarily involve corporeality—particularly the sense organs and the sense appetites. Aquinas offers a succinct overview of the generative order of the passions in the following passage: And if we wish to know the order of all the passions in the way of generation, love [amor] and hatred [odium] are first; desire [desiderium] and aversion [ fuga], second; hope [spes] and despair [desperatio], third; fear [timor] and daring [adacia], fourth; anger [ira], fifth; sixth and last, joy [guadium] and sadness [tristia], which follow from all the passions.8 5 6 7 8 Essays in Honor of Norman Kretzmann, ed. Scott MacDonald and Eleonore Stump [Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2008], 101–32, at 109). Lombardo, Logic of Desire, 43. Aquinas also connects the passions to the cogitative power or particular reason (ST I, q. 78, a. 4), which is a sense power but in human beings naturally operates in connection with the higher intellectual powers. Miner notes: “Aquinas does not reduce the passions to instinctive reactions that are impermeable to rational apprehension. King rightly concludes that for Aquinas ‘the passions are not, after all, similar to our reactions to hot peppers. They can be affected by reasons and beliefs,’ while remaining motions of the sensible appetite” (Thomas Aquinas on the Passions, 38; citing King, “Aquinas on the Passions,” 131). Kahm’s term in Aquinas. ST I-II, q. 25, a. 3. In addition to Logic of Desire, Lombardo gives a clear and concise overview of the eleven passions in “Emotion and Desire in the Summa Theologiae,” in Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae: A Critical Guide, ed. Jeffrey Hause (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018), 111–30, at 118–19. King contends that Aquinas should be commended for giving a taxonomy that is pragmatic versus strict: “But the taxonomy of the passions is not the strict taxonomic division ideally given in biology; the passions are not divided into parts of coordinate species that are exclusive and exhaustive, defined by opposite differentiae. Instead, the different passions are specified by a multiplicity of criteria that allow several coordinate kinds at the same level and different modes of opposition between different pairs of pairs of passions, which are traditionally arranged in pairs (each of which is called a ‘conjunction’) at the same level—except for anger, which has no contrary. All in all, things are fairly messy, and a good deal the more interesting for it” (“Aquinas on the Passions,” 110). 182 Anthony T. Flood Love is the first passion on the list. In fact, throughout his remarks on love, he insists on the principle “love is the root and cause of every emotion.”9 However, Aquinas uses the term “love” both generically and specifically. The striving of the sensible appetites, both in the natural world and in human nature, rightfully fall under the category of love, but these are not love in the fully human sense as an act of the rational appetite. Aquinas further divides the sensitive appetites into the irascible and concupiscible, both of which tend toward or away from sensible goods and evils. The concupiscible appetite concerns the sensible good simply considered. This appetite is home to sensitive love and hate, with their associated movements of desire and aversion, and end resting states of joy and sorrow.10 The irascible appetite pertains to the sensible good under the aspect of the arduous—the preservation of oneself and others in a dangerous world, dangers and evils both found in nature and caused by human beings. Fear and anger reside here, but also what precedes them, namely hope.11 Aquinas identifies joy, sadness, hope, and fear as the four principal passions, which further define an order to the passions in general. [Joy and sadness] are said to be principal because in them all the other passions have their completion and end. . . . Fear and hope are principal passions, not because they complete the others simply, but because they complete them as regards the movement of the appetite towards something. . . . Hence it is customary to distinguish these four passions in relation to the present and the future; for movement regards the future, while rest is in something present: so that joy relates to present good, sadness relates to present evil; hope regards future good, and fear, future evil.12 All the other passions have their completion in these four. Thus, in terms of the ordering of the passions, love (and derivatively hatred) comes first as the moving principle, joy and sadness as the simple completion of concupiscible love, with joy constituting the desired outcome. Hope and 9 10 11 12 ST I-II, q. 62, a. 2, ad 3. ST I-II, q. 63, a. 1. ST I-II, q. 25, a. 3: “Since then in the order of generation or execution, proportion or aptitude to the end precedes the achievement of the end; it follows that, of all the irascible passions, anger is the last in the order of generation. And among the other passions of the irascible faculty, which imply a movement arising from love of the good or hatred of evil, those whose object is good, viz., hope and despair, must naturally precede those whose object is evil, viz., daring and fear.” ST I-II, q. 25, a. 4. Cf. De veritate, q. 26, a. 5. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 183 fear as indexed to future good and evil serve as the completion of the irascible appetite. For a well-ordered life, the irascible and concupiscible appetites must be cultivated by virtue. Several virtues, such as temperance and fortitude, are both seated in and perfective of the sensitive appetite in question.13 The virtues serve to increase the participation of the sense appetites in reason.14 As the participation in reason progresses, the animate emotions become ever more rational. Thus, even in the realm of the sensitive appetites, the passions can have a close connection to the higher operations of the will and reason, but they remain by their nature inextricably tied to corporeality. The affectiones, on the other hand, occur within the spiritual powers themselves. As we will discuss, they can overflow into the passions but need not. Moreover, many of the key terms found in the realm of the passions apply to the context of the affections, as there is an analogous relation between them. Love, concupiscence, and the like can be understood in two ways. Sometimes they are taken as passions—arising, that is, with a certain commotion of the soul. And thus they are commonly understood, and in this sense they are only in the sensitive appetite. They may, however, be taken in another way, as far as they are simple affections without passion or commotion of the soul, and thus they are acts of the will.15 To, then, the affections themselves. Affectiones, Love, and Union Aquinas is not as consistent as one would like with respect to the term affectiones. For the most part, it is a term that applies to feeling states that do not, of their nature, involve sense powers. However, there are other instances where the terminology is more blurred. For instance, in a sed 13 14 15 Aquinas speaks to ten virtues in connection with the passions and some of which admit of various species: temperance, fortitude, liberality, magnificence, love of honor, magnanimity, gentleness, affability, truthfulness, playfulness; justice is connected by operation as well (ST I-II, q. 60, a. 5). As Miner notes, it is only because the sensitive appetites can participate in reason that virtues are applicable to them: “Though non-rational animals have sensitive appetites (and thus the irascible and concupiscible), these powers are not in them the subjects of virtue, because they are not amenable to perfection. . . . But in human beings, the irascible and concupiscible can be perfected, according to their capacity to participate in reason (Thomas Aquinas on the Passions, 288). ST I, q. 82, a. 5, ad 1. 184 Anthony T. Flood contra citing Augustine, Aquinas notes, “From this it is evident that the passions of the soul are the same as affections.”16 However, in tandem with his other texts on the matter, there is a scholarly consensus of the rightful distinction between the sensitive passions and volitional affections. Moreover, both the passions and affections manifest themselves in the person’s conscious experience, but Aquinas is far more concerned with giving an analysis of the powers and operations at play than giving a phenomenological description of the felt aspects.17 In terms of this non-passionate affectivity connected to the activity of the will, Aquinas contends that it is twofold in a manner analogous to the passions. There is an initial complacency in the form of the will’s response to an apprehended good and then a principal affection constitutive of the completion of the act. The simple or spiritual affections18 stem from any good as apprehended by the intellect, but Aquinas places considerable emphasis on the highest realization of them as responses to the goodness of another person and ultimately God. While the good plays the essential objective role in the generation of affections, love as the proper act of the will performs the essential role on the side of the subject. The basic genus of love is love as amor, with love as dilectio as the species of fully human love involving an act of the will.19 The rational appetite or 16 17 18 19 ST I-II, q. 22, a. 2, sc. Addressing this passage in relation to the Summa contra gentiles [SCG], Norman Kretzmann notes: “The SCG passage that concerns me can be illuminated by the ST conclusion if we read the conclusion as claiming only generic sameness between the passions and affectiones, as we can do without obliterating its point. In that case there are affectiones, belonging to the sensory appetite, and they are the passions; but there are also affectiones belonging to the intellectual appetite—i.e., affectiones belonging to the will—and they could not be passions” (“Aquinas on God’s Joy, Love, and Liberality,” The Modern Schoolman 72, no. 2–3 [1995]: 125–48, at 128). Lombardo notes: “Although the internal logic of Aquinas’s system is fundamentally sound, there are some notable omissions and lacunae. The most striking is that he does not describe the subjective experience of emotion: his primary interest is the metaphysics of affectivity, and not the experience of affectivity” (Logic of Desire 247). Aquinas often uses “simple,” as in the passage above, to describe the affections. He also frequently uses the adjective “spiritual,” e.g., in ST II-II, q. 28, a. 1: “Therefore spiritual joy, which is about God, is caused by charity.” He also refers to joyful affectivity and the affectivity of intellectual operations as “spiritual” versus bodily or sensitive pleasures (e.g., ST I-II, q. 31, a. 5). Pinckaers gives a practical overview of the differences between passionate pleasure and affective joy in Passions and Virtue, 42–45. Miner argues against the notion that Aquinas marginalizes sensitive love in favor of rational love: “[For Aquinas] love in its most proper sense is sensitive love, Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 185 will strives after the good as apprehended not by the senses but by the intellect. The will naturally seeks through its immediate act the good as good, and through its commanded acts, it chooses this or that good. The simplex voluntas is the continual response of the will to the presence of good in the world, particularly good as apprehended by the intellect. The active part of love is command—the choice to seek the good. Like with the passions, Aquinas begins with the basic tendency of the appetite, its essential movement, and then the principal affective end state of resting with the good (or sorrowing over its absence). The will’s simple tendency is the love of the good, a love which is activated by a good by means of complacentia: “Accordingly, the first change wrought in the appetite by the appetible object is called love, and is nothing else than complacency in that object.”20 Complacency is a felt attractiveness for an object. Michael Sherwin translates the term as a “pleasing affective affinity.”21 Christopher Malloy offers the definitional description “an affective ‘acceptance of ’ or ‘conformation to’ some good.”22 Sherwin notes that the complacency of properly human love is love of the good, employing Aquinas’s “the proper object of love is the good.”23 While objects can be good as useful or good as pleasant, paradigmatically, the good is bonum honestum—that which is good in itself. Love is first passive because the will undergoes the affective pull from the good acting upon it. Love’s active dimension arises from the commanded act toward the good. Commenting on the connection between the attractiveness wrought in sensible appetites and the complacency specific to the will, Sherwin notes: This definition is the summation of a fuller account that explicitly distinguishes between the emotional love proper to the passions and 20 21 22 23 because sensitive love is most passive. Allowing oneself to be passively helped by God is the precondition of dilectio, of inclining oneself toward God by rational means. Amor sensitivus turns out to be the seed out of which the highest amor rationalis grows. This particular teaching of Aquinas may surprise us. . . . The power of God to draw creatures to himself by sensible means exceeds the power of human reason. Amor sensitivus cannot be neglected by the rational creature in its motion toward God” (Thomas Aquinas on the Passions, 121–22). ST I-II, q. 26, a. 2. Michael S. Sherwin, O.P., By Knowledge and By Love: Charity and Knowledge in the Moral Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2005), 64. Christopher J. Malloy, “Thomas on the Order of Love and Desire,” The Thomist 71, no. 1 (2007): 65–87, at 67. Sherwin, By Knowledge and By Love, 156. See ST I-II, q, 27, a. 1. 186 Anthony T. Flood the spiritual or rational love proper to the will. In both cases, love is the principle of all subsequent motion—whether of the emotions or of the actions that flow from our rational decisions—and is nothing other than a certain pleasing affective affinity for the good [complacentia boni].24 Aquinas addresses two key unions intertwined with love that both further specify these dimensions of love and account for the culmination of love. Dionysius speaks of love as a unitive force, a principle Aquinas cites and employs throughout this account.25 Love effects the union between lover and beloved; more to the point, love is the formal bond itself. Addressing the question of whether union is an effect of love, Aquinas states: The union of lover and beloved is twofold. The first is real union; for instance, when the beloved is present with the lover. The second union is union of affection: and this union must be considered in relation to the preceding apprehension: since movement of the appetite follows apprehension. . . . The first of these unions is caused effectively by love. . . . The second union is caused formally by love.26 The union of affection draws a person toward the good, and the natural term of the movement of love is the real union of person with the good. Real union, and its privation, effect the most acute spiritual affections. For Aquinas, real union causes a pleasant experience, which differs from bodily delight. When the sense appetite achieves real union with an object desired, it produces pleasure and delight. Delight, in this sense, would fall under the passions. On the other hand, when the rational appetite achieves real union, it produces joy, which is a non-corporeal, non-sensible, affective state. A certain delight arises from the apprehension of the reason. Now on the reason apprehending something, not only the sensitive appetite is moved, as regards its application to some particular thing, but also the intellectual appetite, which is called the will. And accordingly, in the intellectual appetite or will there is that delight which is called joy [gaudium], but not bodily delight [delectatio corporalis].27 24 25 26 27 Michael S. Sherwin, O.P., On Love and Virtue: Theological Essays (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2018), 52. See, e.g., ST II-II, q. 25, a. 4. ST I-II, q. 28, a. 1. ST I-II, q. 31, a. 4. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 187 As if to dispel any doubts that joy is essentially non-corporeal, Aquinas ascribes it to God and the angels. When love and joy and the like are ascribed to God or the angels, or to man in respect of his intellectual appetite, they signify simple acts of the will having like effects, but without the passions.28 As hylomorphic unities, human beings tend to experience things with both aspects engaged, but nonetheless, the non-corporeal will is itself home to its own affective dimension. Aquinas extends his analysis of joy in speaking of its contrary, sorrow, and offering some nuances in both: Joy and sorrow proceed from love, but in contrary ways. For joy is caused by love, either through the presence of the thing loved, or because the proper good of the thing loved exists and endures in it; and the latter is the case chiefly in the love of benevolence, whereby a man rejoices in the well-being of his friend, though he be absent. On the other hand sorrow arises from love, either through the absence of the thing loved, or because the loved object to which we wish well, is deprived of its good or afflicted with some evil.29 Sorrow is the spiritual affection caused by the absence of real union with the beloved or the absence of a due good in the beloved. It can also be elicited immanently in relation to analogous absences, such as with the contrite sorrow for one’s sins. Love is the cause in any event, and love persists as that by which sorrow transforms to joy, such as with the arrival of the beloved or her betterment, or in the joy experienced over the forgiveness of one’s sins. Moreover, there are times when one might experience both affections simultaneously, though not in the same respect. When discussing the need to have a habitual sorrow for one’s sins, Aquinas clarifies that such a dispo28 29 ST I-II, q. 22, a. 3, ad 3. Daniel Westberg offers a compelling explanation for why Aquinas’s clearly non-metaphorical attribution of emotion to God is sometimes missed or explained away: “I think the fundamental reason for our difficulties in understanding the problems of divine emotion and the relation of emotion and reason in human action, and why Thomas did not devote any special treatment to the term affectus (which would have helped a great deal), is that the modern view of the will has shifted from the biblical and Augustinian view that incorporated affect, to a mere decision-making faculty independent of and often opposed to emotion” (“Emotion and God: A Reply to Marcel Sarot,” The Thomist 60, no. 1 [1996]: 109–21, at 121). ST II-II, q. 28, a. 1. 188 Anthony T. Flood sition does not preclude joy. “Nothing hinders a man from being joyful and sorrowful at the same time—for instance, if we see a good man suffer, we both rejoice at his goodness and at the same time grieve for his suffering.”30 This occurs frequently in friendship, as one experiences joy in the presence of the beloved while also sorrowing over any evils afflicting him. In terms of the interplay between the passions and affections, while they are different things, as hylomorphic unities, human beings can and do seamlessly experience both. Love, both sensible and rational, is the cause of all the other passions and affections. As a person increases in virtue and the will plays a more dominant role in his life, the passions fall under the sway of rational love. In the context of discussing the passions in relation to the will, Aquinas notes three ways how the former connects to the latter: as object, principle, and effect. The will can love (or not love) given sense passions. The passions can intensify (though never fully cause) an act of the will as a contributing principle to an act.31 Lastly, acts of will can effect passions by way of an overflow.32 In terms of this last relation, he notes: In the powers of the soul there is an overflow from the higher to the lower powers: and accordingly, the pleasure of contemplation, which is in the higher part, overflows so as to mitigate even that pain which is in the senses.33 The activity of the spiritual powers, in the case of intellectual contemplation, provides a salve to unpleasant passions. The will can cause passions by overflow in a more straightforward 30 31 32 33 ST III, q. 84, a. 9, ad 2. Kahm offers a nice analysis showing that the virtuously cultivated passions assist good choice by following the judgment of prudence by also “mildly” orienting a person even prior to the judgment. He thinks some scholars overestimate the role of the latter, but it is still present (Aquinas, 256–66). He treats these notions both in De veritate, (particularly q. 26, a. 6) and the ST. Commenting on this section, Richard R. Baker notes: “The passions, however, can also be related to the will as effects of its own volition. According to St. Thomas, the will can be the cause of these consequent passions in three ways: (a) As directly arousing them as objects of its volition; (b) As indirectly willing them by permitting them to persist after they have arisen from their natural sources; (c) As causing them to arise by reason of a certain redundance from its own acts in the sense appetite. In each of these cases, the passions are said to be voluntary, and the man is responsible for any act resulting from them. As a matter of fact, these consequent passions actually increase the voluntariness of the will’s act” (“The Thomistic Theory of the Passions and Their Influence upon the Will” [PhD diss., University of Notre Dame, 1941], 127). ST I-II, q. 38, a. 4, ad 3. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 189 manner by way of intensification of them. Aquinas speaks to how this occurs in the following passage: Those moral virtues, however, which are not about the passions, but about operations, can be without passions. Such a virtue is justice: because it applies the will to its proper act, which is not a passion. Nevertheless, joy results from the act of justice; at least in the will, in which case it is not a passion. And if this joy be increased through the perfection of justice, it will overflow into the sensitive appetite; insofar as the lower powers follow the movement of the higher, as stated above. Wherefore by reason of this kind of overflow, the more perfect a virtue, the more does it cause passion.34 Further, he refers to the overflow effect as a “redundance.” First, by way of redundance: because, to wit, when the higher part of the soul is intensely moved to anything, the lower part also follows that movement; and thus the passion that results in consequence, in the sensitive appetite, is a sign of the intensity of the will, and so indicates greater moral goodness.35 The experience of the spiritual affections can be inclusive of the experience of the passions. In ordinary life, of course, one would have a unified experience, but the activity of the will would be the dominant cause. Order of the Affections and Friendship While Aquinas does not address an order of the affections as systematically as he does the passions, he consistently uses the latter as guiding blueprint for the former. For instance, we have seen how rational love forms the foundational moving principle for the rest of the affections in the manner analogous to how amor moves the remaining passions. In terms of a further ordering of the affections, we can again look to the passions. Aquinas states the following: Now higher appetite has certain acts similar to those of lower 34 35 ST I-II, q. 59, a. 5. ST I-II, q. 24, a. 3, ad 1. Aquinas continues addressing another positive moral benefit of the passions resulting from a choice to consent with the passions: “Secondly, by way of choice; when, to wit, a man, by the judgment of his reason, chooses to be affected by a passion in order to work more promptly with the co-operation of the sensitive appetite.” On the notion of consent, see Cates, Aquinas on the Emotions, 227. 190 Anthony T. Flood appetite, though without any passion. The operations of higher appetite are accordingly sometimes given the names of the passions. Thus the will for revenge is called “anger,” and the repose of the will in some object of spiritual affection is called “love.” By the same process the will itself which produces these acts is sometimes called “irascible” or “concupiscible,” not properly but by a figure of speech; and even so there is no implication in this that there are in the will two distinct powers corresponding to the irascible and the concupiscible.36 Accordingly, by analogy, joy and sorrow are the principal affections connected to the simple presence of good or evil, while hope and fear are the principal affections concerning the future presence of either. Like with the passions, the desired completion of dilectio love is joy versus sorrow. In terms of the other affections of the will, Aquinas follows the analogy with the passions further by relating them to the principal passions. For instance, in terms of the passions, anger, the desire for vengeance over an inflicted evil, arises from daring, which results from hope “since it is in the hope of overcoming the threatening object of fear, that one attacks it boldly.”37 We can infer that in passages like the above where Aquinas describes the affection of anger as the “will for revenge,” it would follow the same analogous order. The affection of hope would be the source of the affection of anger, not as deriving from a literal irascible part of the will, but activity of the will which resembles the irascible sense appetite. Treating supernatural hope, Aquinas draws the analogy in this fashion: “The object of the irascible is an arduous sensible: whereas the object of the virtue of hope is the arduous intelligible, or rather superintelligible.”38 The object is 36 37 38 De veritate, q. 25, a. 3 (trans. Robert W. Schmidt, S.J. [Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 1994]). Aquinas follows this same analogical reference to the passions in his overview of joy in charity in ST II-II, q. 28, a. 1: “When we were treating the passions, joy and sorrow proceed from love, but in contrary ways. For joy is caused by love, either through the presence of the thing loved, or because the proper good of the thing loved exists and endures in it; and the latter is the case chiefly in the love of benevolence, whereby a man rejoices in the well-being of his friend, though he be absent. On the other hand, sorrow arises from love, either through the absence of the thing loved, or because the loved object to which we wish well, is deprived of its good or afflicted with some evil. Now charity is love of God, Whose good is unchangeable, since He is His goodness, and from the very fact that He is loved, He is in those who love Him by His most excellent effect. . . . Therefore spiritual joy, which is about God, is caused by charity.” ST I-II, q. 45, a. 2. ST II-II, q. 18, a. 1, ad 1. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 191 “superintelligible” in this context due to the supernatural nature of virtue, but “arduous intelligible” for the natural affection itself. We have already encountered examples in which Aquinas uses the context of friendship to discuss the affections. This makes sense, given that love as amor is the root of the passions and love as dilectio, itself an affection, is the root of the rest of the affections, and love’s fullest expression is friendship. Accordingly, I want to expand on his account of friendship a bit to show the place of the affections within it, which in turn will lay the groundwork for the final section on love as caritas serving as the basis for ordering actions to God. Aquinas characterizes friendship in general as making “one heart of two,”39 where the heart is understood as the highest operations of the spiritual powers.40 He calls attention to several essential properties of friendship: Every friend wishes his friend to be and to live; secondly, he desires good things for him; thirdly, he does good things to him; fourthly, he takes pleasure in his company; fifthly, he is of one mind with him, rejoicing and sorrowing in almost the same things.41 To this list, he adds the mutual indwelling of entering into each other’s heart. What is noteworthy about this very robust view of friendship is that, first and foremost, it is a kind of love and thus resides most fully in 39 40 41 See SCG IV, ch. 21: “For, since charity unites affections and makes, as it were, one heart of two, one seems not to have dismissed from his heart that which he reveals to a friend” (trans. Charles J. O’Neil [Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1975]). Super Ioan 13, lec. 2 (no. 1762), trans. Fabian R. Larcher, O.P., ed. The Aquinas Institute (Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2013). Throughout his scriptural commentaries, he tends to interpret passages having to do with the interior life as referring to the heart. For instance, commenting in Super Matt 6, lec. 2 (no. 576), on Jesus’s words that prayer should be done privately by withdrawing to one’s chamber, Aquinas states, “by chamber can be understood the secret interior of the heart” (trans. Jeremy Holmes, ed. The Aquinas Institute [Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2013]). Also, speaking in Super Ioan 5, lec. 2 (no. 730), of Christ finding a man he cured of infirmity in the temple, he notes: “We see from this that this man was not cured in vain, but having been converted to a religious way of life, he visited the temple and found Christ: because if we desire to come to the knowledge of the Creator, we must run from the tumult of sinful affections, leave the company of evil men, and flee to the temple of the heart, where God condescends to visit and live.” ST I-II, q. 25, a. 7. 192 Anthony T. Flood the will.42 While friendship obviously involves knowledge of the beloved, its root is the will, and that root is the willing of goods to the beloved for her own sake. Aquinas distinguishes between the love of concupiscence and the love of friendship. The love of concupiscence is the desire for the good being willed. For instance, the lover wills the delightful experience afforded by drinking wine, but that love must be directed to someone—the “someone” is that to which the love of friendship refers. The object of the love of friendship is the person to whom one wills the good. As Jensen puts it, “It is incoherent, then, to want the good without loving the subject for whom it is good.”43 In friendship, the person is the beloved. A person wills the delightful experience of drinking wine with a love of concupiscence, but he wills it for the sake of his friend. Every act of love includes both dimensions, but often the person to whom one wills the good is oneself through the love of self. Not every relationship called “friendship” involves the love of the other for his own sake in an unqualified sense. Aquinas adopts and adapts Aristotle’s account of the three levels of friendship, based on what is principally loved. As discussed previously, “goods,” or that which is loved, admits of the threefold distinction of use, pleasure, and the bonum honestum. When friendship is based on usefulness or pleasure, a man does indeed wish his friend some good; and in this respect the character of friendship is preserved. But since he refers this good further to his own pleasure or use, the result is that friendship of the useful or pleasant, insofar as it is connected with love of concupiscence, loses the character of true friendship.44 The distinction between the three kinds of friendship relates to the distinction between passions and affections. A friendship of utility or pleasure engages the passions much more so than the affections. Pleasure and use connect most properly to the concupiscible and irascible appetites; in other words, they are passions. On the other hand, true friendship involves the love of friendship for the other—the other recognized and responded to as a bonum honestum. As true friendship connects most properly to the will, it directly engages the affections. The love of friendship is the same as benevolence and beneficence— 42 43 44 ST I-II, q. 26, a. 3. Steven J. Jensen. Sin: A Thomistic Psychology (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2018), 104. ST I-II, q. 26, a. 4, ad 3. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 193 willing and seeking goods for the other’s sake. The love of friendship, while necessary, is still not sufficient for true friendship. Friendship is interpersonal, and accordingly, requires both that the love toward the beloved become habitual and a reciprocation of the same kind of love from the beloved. “For a true and firm friendship the friends need a mutual love for each other; for this duplication makes it true and firm.”45 The mutual love allows for culmination of love’s real union. “[Friends] seek a suitable and becoming union—to live together, speak together, and be united together in other like things.”46 The love of friendship forms the root and driving principle that seeks the real union with the other. Mutual indwelling forms the interpersonal nexus of friendship proper. Aquinas characterizes indwelling as the entering into the hearts of each other and, thereby, that by which one heart is made of two. Like the ecstasy which is essential to it, it involves both knowing (apprehensive power) and willing (appetitive power).47 Regarding the former, the lover is “not satisfied with a superficial apprehension of the beloved but strives to gain an intimate knowledge of everything pertaining to the beloved.”48 With respect to the will and thereby the spiritual affections, the lover experiences the beloved with full complacency—she is something that causes a strong affective affinity. Here “the complacency in the beloved is rooted in the lover’s heart.”49 The lover, though, is also in the beloved’s heart, but not just by way of reciprocation of complacency. Rather, the lover identifies with the will of the beloved. “Consequently insofar as he reckons what affects his friend as affecting himself, the lover seems to be in the beloved, 45 46 47 48 49 Super Ioan 13, lec. 7 (no. 1837). ST I-II, q. 28, a. 1, ad 2. Miner provides an excellent gloss on ecstasy and friendship: “Aquinas does not want a notion of ecstasy that opposes self-love and the love of the other. Yet he does not dispense with the notion of exstasis. Rather, he applies it to the apprehensive as well as the appetitive power. If reason can be raised above its connatural apprehension, it can equally fall beneath it, as when overcome (passus) by furtia or amentia. I would hazard that Thomas’s deepest intention in the ST is to produce a rational ecstasy, an elevation of the reason beyond its connatural apprehension that does not destroy its rational character, but perfects it. Such elevation is legitimately described as ecstasy, perhaps even as divine madness, but it does not entail a loss of self. It leads to another kind of occurrence, one that Aquinas (no less than Socrates) was attested to exemplify in his own life: ‘intense meditation on one thing draws the mind away (abstrahit) from other things’ (28.3.co)” (Thomas Aquinas on the Passions, 136). ST I-II, q. 28, a. 2. ST I-II, q. 28, a. 2. 194 Anthony T. Flood as though he were become one with him.”50 This is why friends sorrow and rejoice in the same things. The will is the source of spiritual affections; as the wills become as one as possible, so do the affections—thereby effecting the full (natural) realization of love’s union of affection. Virtual Ordering Affections are features of acts of the will. I am going to make the case that due to this, the different ways that those acts can be ordered to a good, particularly the ultimate good, have a bearing on how a person experiences the affections. In other words, if affections are constitutive of the acts of the will itself, different sorts of ordering of the acts will have a direct impact on the affections themselves. Osborne frames his study on Aquinas’s distinction between habitual, virtual, and actual ordering of acts to ends in terms of charity. The relationship between individual acts and God as the ultimate end is especially problematic with respect to the command to love God from one’s whole heart, which Thomas and his contemporaries understand to mean not only that God must be loved above everything else, but also that every action must be referred to God. This aspect of the command is especially brought out in a dictum of St. Paul: Do everything for the glory of God (Omnia in gloriam dei facite). Although Thomas gives slightly different interpretations of this dictum during his career, he consistently states that it does not oblige someone to think of God in each act. In these interpretations he contrasts actual referral with either virtual or habitual referral.51 Aquinas thinks the dictum to love God can be perfectly followed in terms of all acts actually referred to God only in heaven. In this life, it is just not possible. However, he also thinks a habitual ordering alone is insufficient to fulfill it. Accordingly, he suggests a virtual ordering as an acceptable middle way. To define and characterize these terms, then, a person actually refers or orders his act to an end when he deliberately and consciously directs his act to the end. I will use Jensen’s example. “Anna consciously directs her act of driving to the end of getting milk.”52 She is actively thinking about the 50 51 52 ST I-II, q. 28, a. 2. Thomas Osborne, “The Threefold Referral of Acts to the Ultimate End in Thomas Aquinas and His Commentators,” Angelicum 85, no. 3 (2008): 715–36, at 717. Jensen, Sin, 18. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 195 end while performing the means to it. To virtually order an act to an end requires a previous actual ordering but not an ongoing explicit thinking about it. As long as the ordering to that end is maintained, other acts along the way are virtually ordered to the end in question. Modifying his example to reflect virtual ordering, Jensen notes that, “while driving, Anna need not be thinking about the milk.”53 Even though she is not actively thinking about the end, her action itself will preserve its direction and maintain its character to that end. The term “virtual” is taken from virtue; “According to Thomas, the virtue or power (virtus) of the ultimate end remains in the acts that follow it.”54 Habitual ordering is the weakest of the three. As long as the person does not act contrary to an end, a generalized ordering to the end remains. A mother, even while sleeping, still loves her child, even though she is not actually or even virtually referring any act to the child at that time. Both Osborne and Jensen draw out the implications of these distinctions for sin. Mortal sin destroys the habitual ordering to God, which entails the destruction of the virtual and actual ordering as well. Venial sin does not destroy the habitual ordering to God, which is why the habit of charity remains intact. However, venial sin is neither actually nor virtually ordered to God. Expanding on the context of mortal sin, it is possible to perform good acts even in this state, but such acts will not be meritorious. The reason for this is the acts are neither actually nor virtually referred to God. In contrast to this, with charity, all good acts are meritorious. For such agents who possess charity, all good acts are meritorious because they are at least virtually referred to God. Agents who venially sin but have charity do not merit through their venial sin. A mere habitual ordering of acts to God is not enough for merit because merit comes from acts rather than habits. The virtual ordering depends on an actual ordering and is thereby meritorious.55 Habitual ordering to God preserves charity, but a habit alone does not suffice for merit. Merit requires action. Both virtual and actual ordering go beyond mere habit to involve acts. This is particularly important to 53 54 55 Jensen, Sin, 19. Thomas Osborne, “Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus on Individual Acts and the Ultimate End,” in Philosophy and Theology in the Long Middle Ages: A Tribute to Stephen F. Brown, ed. Kent Emery Jr., Russell L. Friedman, and Andreas Speer (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 351–74, at 357. Osborne, “Threefold Referral,” 721. 196 Anthony T. Flood my interpretation of the influence that these three orderings have on the affections. A habitual order by itself will not engage the affections.56 The person may very well be disposed to joy, sorrow, and so on, but the affections themselves are constitutive of acts. Conversely, in terms of actual ordering, actual acts do involve affections. I contend that a person whose acts are virtually ordered to an end will experience some share of affectivity even in those acts that might not, in and of themselves, effect affectivity. Analogous to how driving the car is virtually connected to getting the milk and thereby characterized by the act of getting milk, a person’s whose actions are virtually connected to God might experience joy even in acts not actually ordered to God. By virtue of the power of the ordering to God, acts along the way to God, so to speak, can elicit the affections. For instance, a person might experience joy in God while doing the dishes, not because dishwashing is the possession of some greatly desirable good nor even because he is consciously directing the act to God. Rather, a previous actual referral and ongoing virtual referral accounts for the joy. The same structure appears in cases of ordering to non-ultimate ends. For instance, the mother, while buying milk for her children, might experience joy over her children even if the milk-buying is only virtually ordered to them. In other words, she need not be explicitly thinking about them to experience a joy due to them. 56 Aquinas thinks that the composite nature of man precludes any feeling state, passion or affection, from being guaranteed by a given good or activity. I am speaking of those occasions where the possession or privation of a good would likely elicit a given affection. Aquinas speaks to the inconstancy of the passions and affections in his commentary on Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics: “The first observation is that the same object is not always pleasurable to man. He says that the reason is that our nature is not simple but composite, and is changeable from one thing to another inasmuch as it is subject to deterioration. For this reason if man performs an action pleasurable to him according to one element, this pleasure is unnatural to him according to a different element. Thus contemplation is nature to man by reason of his intellect but beyond the natural scope of the powers of imagination which try to take an active part in the work of contemplation. Therefore contemplation is not always delightful to man. It is the same with the taking of food, which is natural to man who needs it but not natural to a body already surfeited. But when a man approaches the opposite condition, then what was pleasurable in his previous condition seems to be neither distressing, because the opposite condition has not yet been reached, nor still pleasurable because the other condition has now almost been passed” (In VII eth., lec. 14, no. 1534; trans. C. I. Litzinger, O.P. [Notre Dame, IN: Dumb Ox, 1993]). For commentary on this passage, see Kretzmann, “Aquinas on God’s Joy, Love, and Liberality,” 134. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 197 In the case of love, I think my interpretation of Aquinas on virtual ordering is un-contentious. He identifies rational love itself as an affection. Rational love simply is the act of the will he treats in relation to virtual ordering. This is part of the reason why it is the context of friendship where love is the strongest. While friends cannot actually love one another continually, their love is stronger than being merely habitual. Friends virtually order their loving acts toward each other. I maintain that due to the structure and ordering of the affections, particularly the principal affections as the completion of love, virtual ordering of acts directly engages the remaining affections. I will further defend and illustrate this claim in the next section with the affections of sorrow and joy as found in acts virtually ordered to God. Prior to doing that, one more note is in order on how the possibility of virtual ordering also serves to further distinguish the affections from the passions. The affections derive from the will. Since the actions of the will can be virtually ordered to an end, the affections associated with those kinds of actions can be experienced in some sort of “virtual manner.”57 This is not the case with the passions, at least not directly. The passions arise from sense apprehension and sense appetites. Insofar as those appetites can be habituated by the will, a person can cultivate strong, passionate aversions away from sense evils and delight in sense goods. However, the passions themselves remain either habitual or actual. There is no virtual order because they are not directly constitutive of deliberately willed acts. The key connection between the affections and passions with respect to virtual ordering is Aquinas’s notion of “redundant” overflow. Intense activity of the will with its strong affections can (but need not) spill over into the body and stir up the passions. An oppressive sorrow can effect a passionate despair, but also an affective joy can elicit bodily pleasure. To the degree that the virtual order of acts of the will serves to sustain the affections, the more likely a person will experience the associated passions. Charity and the Affections It is within the context of friendship that Aquinas speaks to the deep and abiding nature of affections going beyond discrete, explicit acts, which I think are best characterized as affections rooted in virtual ordering. On the natural level, it is true friendship, with the full engagement of the loving will, in which the affections are present in the sustained, abid57 Experiencing something in a “virtual manner” is not the best literal description, but it distinguishes an affection experienced in an act actually ordered versus one virtually ordered. 198 Anthony T. Flood ing manner connected with one’s virtual love for the friend. However, as Aquinas focuses on the context of God as the ultimate end while discussing virtual ordering, it is charity as friendship with God58 in which he discusses the affections most frequently, particularly the principal affections of sorrow and joy. Through charity, God supernaturally communicates a share of his life to human beings, thus establishing a sufficient basis for friendship with him.59 This allows for a friendship of greater intensity relative to mere human relationships, which in turn entails the possibility of more intense affections than those experienced in human friendships. We see this most clearly in the case of the principal affections joy and sorrow. In the case of the latter, Aquinas speaks to the penitential sorrow for one’s sins before God and sorrowing over offenses by others toward God. Like in human friendships, where we rejoice and sorrow over the same things, friendship with God involves rejoicing and sorrowing in accord with what God holds dear. While friendship with God can elicit the most intense affection of joy, Aquinas makes it clear that the person must tend toward loving God for his own sake and not for the sake of consolation and joy; otherwise, God would be reduced to a mere means for the person to have joy. This point is already clear in his account of human friendships, whereby a true friendship must be directed to the other as other versus as a means for use or pleasure. Nonetheless, Aquinas thinks the self-directed desire for divine delight serves as a step in the ladder toward spiritual perfection. To articulate this, he speaks of the virtue of hope that prepares the way for charity. In the order of perfection, charity precedes hope (though in the order of generation, it is the reverse) as representing perfect love and friendship. Hope pertains to the love of God with a love of concupiscence and as a future good to be obtained, while charity pertains to love of God with a love of friendship.60 Hope presupposes love of that which a man hopes to obtain; and such love is love of concupiscence, whereby he who desires good, 58 59 60 ST II-II, q. 23, a. 1. ST II-II, q. 23, a. 1. Also, see Joseph Bobik, “Aquinas on Communicatio: The Foundation of Friendship and Caritas,” Modern Schoolman 64 (1986): 1–18. More recently, Reinhard Hütter points to the foundational role communicatio performs in Aquinas’s understanding of charity (Bound for Beatitude: A Thomistic Study of Eschatology and Ethics [Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2019], 249). On this point, I am indebted to Sherwin, On Love and Virtue, 103. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 199 loves himself rather than something else. On the other hand, charity implies love of friendship.61 Aquinas emphasizes that only charity pertains to the perfect love of God. Now there is a perfect, and an imperfect love. Perfect love is that whereby a man is loved in himself, as when someone wishes a person some good for his own sake; thus a man loves his friend. Imperfect love is that whereby a man loves something, not for its own sake, but that he may obtain that good for himself; thus a man loves what he desires. The first love of God pertains to charity, which adheres to God for His own sake; while hope pertains to the second love, since he that hopes, intends to obtain possession of something for himself.62 Friendship with God brings about the experience of the highest affections, but analogous to human friendships, these affections arise most vigorously when the beloved is loved for his own sake.63 Aquinas’s remarks on sorrow most directly and strongly support my interpretation of him as affirming a virtual manner of experiencing the affections. He treats both the negative sorrow of relating to God as an evil but also the positive sorrow of contrition. Also, Aquinas’s comments on joy in God indicate to me something deeper than just a habitual disposition to the experience of joy. I will begin with sorrow and conclude with joy. Contrition grieves over one’s past sins and the prospect of future sinning. Aquinas treats penance as both a sacrament and a virtue, as the material side of the former entails the human acts of contrition, confession, and satisfaction.64 Contrition is the grief or sorrow for one’s sins. [Sorrow for one’s sins] denotes an act of the will, and in this way it 61 62 63 64 ST I-II, q. 66, a. 6, ad 2. ST II-II, q. 17, a. 8. In terms of the affection of fear in relation to God, Aquinas specifies that God cannot be feared as an evil object, but he can be and should be feared as a source of evil coming “from Him or in relation to Him.” God can be feared as a source of punishment and as an object from which one can be separated (ST II-II, q. 19, a. 1). See ST II-II, q. 28, a. 1, ad 3: “There can be spiritual joy about God in two ways. First, when we rejoice in the Divine good considered in itself; second, when we rejoice in the Divine good as participated by us. The former joy is the better, and proceeds from charity chiefly: while the latter joy proceeds from hope also, whereby we look forward to enjoy the Divine good, although the enjoyment itself, whether perfect or imperfect, is obtained according the measure of one’s charity.” ST III, q. 84, a. 2. 200 Anthony T. Flood implies choice. . . . Now it belongs to right reason that one should grieve for a proper object of grief as one ought to grieve, and for an end for which one ought to grieve. And this is observed in the penance of which we are speaking now; since the penitent assumes a moderated grief for his past sins, with the intention of removing them.65 The sorrow of contrition is a clear affection, as it is not reducible to a sense appetite. It performs an essential role in the restoration of the proper relation to God consequent to sin’s disordering. Interestingly, Aquinas suggests that the sorrow of contrition can counter a very different, and sinful, affective sorrow. Concerning sinful sorrow, Aquinas defines the mortal sin and capital vice of sloth as an “oppressive sorrow” over the divine good.66 This form of sorrow causes an aversion to God. “Sloth is not an aversion of the mind from any spiritual good, but from the Divine good, to which the mind is obliged to adhere. . . . He is sorry to have to do something for God’s sake.”67 Contrition reverses this movement: Now, the first damage which man sustains from sin is the disordering of the mind; in that man is turned away from the incommutable good—namely, God—and is turned toward sin. . . . Therefore, the first thing required in penance is the ordering of the mind; namely, that the mind be turned toward God, and turned away from sin, grieving at its commission, and proposing not to commit it; and this belongs essentially to contrition.68 65 66 67 68 ST III, q. 85, a. 1. Gilles Emery offers a succinct definition of Thomistic contrition as the “sorrow or remorse for sins committed with, under the impulse of charity, the intention of removing the consequence of sin, which is the offense committed against God” (“Reconciliation with the Church and Interior Penance: The Contribution of Thomas Aquinas on the Question of the Res et Sacramentum of Penance,” Nova et Vetera [English] 1, no. 2 [2003]: 283–302, at 294). ST II-II, q. 35, a. 1. Rebecca Konynkyk DeYoung has several works on the subject of Aquinas’s account of sloth that have informed my thinking on the matter: “Resistance to the Demands of Love: Aquinas on the Vice of Acedia,” The Thomist 68, no. 2 (2004): 173–204; “Aquinas on the Vice of Sloth: Three Interpretive Issues,” The Thomist 75, no. 1 (2011): 43–64; “Sloth: Some Historical Reflections on Laziness, Effort, and the Resistance to the Demands of Love,” in Virtues and Their Vices, eds. Kevin Timpe and Craig A. Boyd (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 177–98. ST II-II, q. 35, a. 2, ad 2. SCG IV, ch. 72. Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 201 Sloth sorrows over the divine good as an evil to be shunned, while contrition involves the right willed relation to the divine good as good. Consequently, the sorrow of contrition involves a proper relation to God and grieves over the sinful separation of oneself from that good. I think it is clear that the oppressive sorrow of sloth exceeds that which is merely habitual. It is an actual, deeply abiding, and sustained weighing down of the mind and will in relation to the divine good. Yet, it does not seem quite accurate to say it is actual in the sense of the person continually deliberately and consciously acting to generate the affection. Virtual ordering makes much more sense. The slothful person commits the actual mortal sin of sloth and sustains that orientation and the associated affection of sorrow by not deliberately acting contrary to it. Moreover, all the subsequent acts, even if not conscious acts of sloth, are informed and colored by the now virtual ordering away from the divine good. Contrite sorrow operates in a similar way but with a different end to which it is ordered, namely God as the ultimate end. A person is not merely disposed by habit to grieve over sin but rather is marked by an ongoing affective aversion permeating and encompassing all sorts of other actions. Aquinas calls this a “virtual displeasure,” and speaks to its superiority over a mere habitual displeasure in the context of protecting one from sin. But this [remembering each sin individually] is not required for the forgiveness of venial sins; although it does not suffice to have habitual displeasure [habitualis displicentia], which is included in the habit of charity or of penance as a virtue, since then venial sin would be incompatible with charity, which is evidently untrue. Consequently it is necessary to have a certain virtual displeasure [virtualis displicentia], so that, for instance, a man’s affections so tend to God and Divine things, that whatever might happen to him to hamper that tendency would be displeasing to him, and would grieve him, were he to commit it, even though he were not to think of it actually.69 Once appropriately directed to the divine good through an actual act of contrition, a contrite sorrow will be virtually present in all a person does. This need not make a person morose. Recall that Aquinas thinks multiple affections are possible at the same time. “Nothing hinders a man from being joyful and sorrowful at the same time—for instance, if we see a good 69 ST III, q. 87, a. 1. 202 Anthony T. Flood man suffer, we both rejoice at his goodness and at the same time grieve for his suffering.”70 A contrite sorrow is compatible with joy. The virtuous character and desirable nature of contrite sorrow are not absolute. Because human beings fell from God through sin, contrite sorrow became necessary as a restorative principle and safeguard from future sins. But in the order of nature, had human beings not fallen, there would be no reason to desire penance or contrition. Joy, on the other hand, is simply good, and as we have addressed, it represents the most straightforward and desirable completion of the rational appetite—in this case the rational appetite as supernaturally transformed by charity. In terms of the joy found in relating to God as the ultimate end, it is only partial now due, not to the good itself, but to the limited ability to possess the good. Our Lord wants us to become sharers of his joy by observing his commandments. . . . The goods in which we rejoice are either imperfect or imperfectly possessed; and so in this life our joy cannot be full. But it will be full when perfect goods are perfectly possessed.71 Moreover, throughout his commentaries on Scripture, Aquinas consistently notes that when Scripture speaks to joy, it is predominately as a spiritual affection versus passion; “fill you with all joy, i.e., spiritual, which is concerned with God.”72 It is also the chief affection found in relation to God; “But the ultimate end that perfects man inwardly is joy, which proceeds from the presence of the thing loved.”73 In addition, spiritual joy, while partial, has a great consoling effect relative to the trials of this life; “And [Paul] says, for I have had great joy and consolation. . . . For this joy alleviates anxiety.” 74 Aquinas expands upon this last point in relation to friendship with God. It is also a property of friendship that one take delight in a friend’s 70 71 72 73 74 ST III, q. 84, a. 9, ad 2. Super Ioan (no. 2004). Super Rom 15, lec. 1 (no. 1162), trans. Fabian R. Larcher, O.P., ed. J. Mortensen and E. Alarcon (Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012). Super Gal 5, lec. 6 (no. 330), trans. Fabian R. Larcher, O.P., and M. L. Lamb, ed. by J. Mortensen and E. Alarcon (Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012). Thomas Aquinas, Super Phlm 1, lec. 1 (no. 11), trans. Fabian R. Larcher, O.P., ed. J. Mortensen and E. Alarcon (Lander, WY: Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012). Virtual Ordering and the Affectiones in Aquinas 203 presence, rejoice in his words and deeds, and find in him security against all anxieties; and so it is especially in our sorrows that we hasten to our friends for consolation. Since, then, the Holy Spirit constitutes us God’s friends, and makes Him dwell in us, and us dwell in Him, it follows that through the Holy Spirit we have joy in God and security again all the world’s adversities and assaults.75 Joy has a stable presence that is maintained even through other acts, even those involving hardship. Such joy is best characterized not as limited to discrete acts of relating to God, but rather as a sustained, deeply abiding affective state rooted in the mutual indwelling of divine friendship. If the person’s acts are virtually ordered to God, then this accounts for how all the acts making up a person’s conscious life sustain the joy in question. Moments of actually ordering an act to God no doubt serve to reinvigorate the affection, but the affection tends to remain beyond even those deliberate acts. In summary, to have a perfect friendship with God, one must love God for his own sake. Through charity, that is exactly what occurs, replete with the spiritual affections experienced through making “one heart of two.” Actions actually ordered to God elicit the affections, especially joy. What accounts for the sustained, deep, and abiding character of them is their connection to virtual ordering. The virtual joy of friendship with God, in turn, serves to draw a person into an ever-deeper relationship with God. “We draw near to God by no corporeal steps, since He is everywhere, but by the affections of our soul, and by the actions of that same soul do we withdraw from Him.” 76 Moreover, Aquinas notes that joy effects “the dilatation of the heart.” 77 The more joy one experiences in relation to God, the more one’s heart is open to a greater and greater intimacy with him. In conclusion, Aquinas affirms the Pauline exhortation to “do everything for the glory of God.” However, the limitations inherent to the life of the wayfarer prevent an actual ordering of all acts to God, but the possibility of a virtual ordering remains. Just as the virtual ordering orients all that a person does to God, so too does it promote the possibility of deep and abiding, though still only partial, experience of joy. Once a person passes into the state of blessedness, then the virtual ordering will give way to an 75 76 77 SCG IV, ch. 22. ST I, q. 3, a. 1, ad 5. ST I-II, q. 33, a. 3, ad 3. Miner comments: “According to Aquinas, the most powerful agent for opening the heart’s doors is gaudium. By expanding the affections, spiritual joys from this life prepare the heart to receive still greater pleasures in the next” (Thomas Aquinas on the Passions, 179). 204 Anthony T. Flood actual ordering and, thereby, the deep and abiding joyful experience will give way to the perfect experience of joy: “Hence desire will be at rest, not only our desire for God, but all our desires: so that the joy of the blessed is full of perfection—indeed over-full, since they will obtain more than they were capable of desiring.” 78 N&V 78 ST II-II, q. 28, a. 3. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 205–239 205 Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature: The Philosophical and Theological Exegesis of 2 Peter 1:4 Daniel Joseph Gordon University of Notre Dame Notre Dame, IN Thomas Aquinas often refers to grace as a participation in the divine nature, linking this enigmatic description of grace with a verse from 2 Peter 1:4 that “we will be made partakers of the divine nature.”1 This notion of being made “partakers” of the divine nature arguably contains the seed of the whole doctrine of grace in Saint Thomas. Indeed, it is no accident that the first reference to participatio in the questions on grace (Summa theologiae [ST] I-II, qq. 109–14) comes in question 110, on the essence of grace.2 Grappling with what it means to be made a partaker of the divine nature would thus promise to elucidate the Thomasian understanding of grace, in its many varieties. Several studies have examined the role of 2 Peter 1:4 in the Common 1 2 For example, see In II sent., d. 23, q. 1, a. 1; Summa contra gentiles [SCG] IV, ch. 4, no. 3; Summa theologiae [ST] I, q. 13, a. 9, obj. 1; I-II, q. 50, a. 2; q. 62, a. 1; q. 110, aa. 3–4; II-II, q. 85, a. 2, obj. 1; III, q. 3, a. 4, ad 3; q. 22, a. 1; Super Ioan 15, lec. 2 (no. 1999); Super Rom 1, lec. 4 (no. 72); Super Eph 3, lec. 5 (no. 185); Super Tit 3, lec. 1 (no. 92); Super Heb 8 lec. 2 (no. 392); Quaestio disputata de anima, q. 7; In symbolum apostolorum, a. 3. The Latin texts cited are from corpusthomisticum.org, often from the available Leonine texts. Unless noted, translations are my own. Italicizations of the Latin are my own, as a convenience for the reader. Unless otherwise stated, scriptural passages in this article are from the Revised Standard Version, 2nd Catholic ed. The significance of the first reference to 2 Pet 1:4 in the “treatise” on grace is perhaps twofold: first, it would seem to signal a special connection with habitual grace, which seems to be the focus of the question; second, it may also indicate that Thomas sees the verse as essential to our understanding of what grace is. 206 Daniel Joseph Gordon Doctor’s teaching on grace, but few of these focus exclusively on 2 Peter 1:4, and even fewer attempt to place Thomas in conversation with modern scriptural criticism.3 This study thus aims to show what Thomas means by calling grace a participation in the divine nature, through a systematic 3 In her study on deification according to Thomas Aquinas, Daria Spezzano offers the most recent and comprehensive discussion of 2 Pet 1:4 as it appears in the Common Doctor’s writings; see The Glory of God’s Grace: Deification according to St. Thomas Aquinas (Naples, FL: Sapientia Press, 2015). The present study differs from Spezzano’s work in at least two ways. First, this paper places Thomas in conversation with several historical-critical perspectives on 2 Pet 1:4. The emphasis is thus not so much to discuss deification, as it is to show that Thomas reads the verse in a manner that reconciles both “covenantal” and “Hellenistic” interpretations of the text, as suggested by recent scriptural critics. Second, the present study focuses exclusively on the Common Doctor’s use of 2 Pet 1:4. By limiting the discussion to this verse, the present work aims to concentrate the discussion, presenting a succinct dossier on how Thomas uses the text. In a similar vein, see Daniel A. Keating, “Justification, Sanctification, and Divinization,” in Aquinas on Doctrine: A Critical Introduction, ed. Thomas G. Weinandy, Daniel A. Keating, and John Yocum (London: T&T Clark, 2004). On the metaphysical aspects of grace and participation, see Melissa Eitenmiller, “Grace as Participation According to St. Thomas Aquinas,” New Blackfriars 98, no. 1078 (2017): 689–708. For a treatment that discusses charity in terms of divinization, see Reinhard Hütter, “Grace and Charity: Participation in the Divine Nature and Union with God: The Surpassing Contemporary Significance of Thomas Aquinas’s Doctrine of Divinization,” Espíritu 65, no. 151 (2016): 173–99. For a recent introduction to Catholic views on grace and justification, see Joseph P. Wawrykow, “Grace and Justification,” in The Oxford Handbook of Catholic Theology, ed. Lewis Ayres and Medi Ann Volpe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 403–22. For a more detailed study on grace and merit in a classic form, see Wawrykow, God’s Grace and Human Action: “Merit” in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2016). On Thomas as a “scriptural theologian,” see Thomas G. Weinandy, Daniel A. Keating, and John Yocum, Aquinas on Scripture: An Introduction to His Biblical Commentaries (New York: T & T Clark International, 2005). On the Cyrilian engagement with the text, see Weinandy and Keating, The Theology of St. Cyril of Alexandria: A Critical Appreciation (London: T&T Clark, 2003). On the general absence of 2 Pet 1:4 in the exegesis of Augustine, see David Vincent Meconi, The One Christ: St. Augustine’s Theology of Deification (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2013), esp. 129–30: “If Augustine hesitates in using deificare because of how the connotations of such a term were being used by his rivals, we can also argue here that this is precisely why he never relies on 2 Pet. 1:4 and humanity’s participation in the divine nature. . . . The only instances of his citing 2 Pet. 1:4 [occurs] when he reports how it has been co-opted by the Pelagians.” According to Meconi, “if we participate in a sinless God, we too remain sinless (so went Augustine’s understanding of how Caelestius used 2 Pet. 1:4)” (53). Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 207 investigation of the Thomasian corpus, in conversation with select perspectives from recent scriptural criticism. Although the purpose of the present study is not historical-critical in its conception or method, one can profitably compare the treatment of 2 Peter 1:4 in the works of Aquinas to recent historical-critical considerations of the verse. Representing what I call the “covenantal” reading, Albert Wolters challenges the criticism that “2 Peter 1:4 represents something alien, or at least unusual, in the New Testament.”4 The “main point” of Wolters is that “the translation ‘partakers of the divine nature’ is not at all as self-evident as the widespread consensus of the versions makes it appear to be and that a plausible alternative is the rendering ‘partners of the Deity,’ which has no overtones of ontological participation in the being of God.”5 Representing what I call the “Hellenistic” reading, Werner Kümmel argues that “it would be hard to find in the whole New Testament a sentence which, in its expression, its individual motifs and its whole trend, more clearly marks the relapse of Christianity into Hellenistic dualism.”6 These positions represent two extremes, construing 2 Peter 1:4 either as a “relapse of Christianity into Hellenistic dualism” (the “Hellenistic” reading of Kümmel) or parsing the verse as exhibiting “no overtones of ontological participation in the being of God” (the “covenantal” reading of Wolters). In a more recent work, James Starr presents a middle ground between these two extremes, offering a balanced reading of the Hellenistic background of 2 Peter 1:4 in light of Josephus, Philo of Alexandria, Plutarch of Chaeroneia, as well as the Old Testament and Paul.7 In his discussion of the “cultural intertexture” of the verse, Starr argues that “the complex of ideas in 1:1–11 anchors 2 Peter most firmly in the epistolary and theological tradition of Pauline Christianity, but he brings to that tradition compatible elements from the Hellenistic philosophical tradition particularly as it was voiced by Middle Platonism.”8 Aquinas, I will argue, falls somewhere 4 5 6 7 8 Albert Wolters, “‘Partners of the Deity’: A Covenantal Reading of 2 Peter 1:4,” Calvin Theological Journal 25, no. 1 (1990): 29. Wolters, “Partners of the Deity,” 29–30. Werner Kümmel, Man in the New Testament, rev. ed, trans. J. J. Vincent (London: Epworth, 1963), 93 (quoted in Wolters, “Partners of the Deity,” 29). For the Hellenistic reading, see also works by Ernst Käsemann. See James M. Starr, Sharers in Divine Nature: 2 Peter 1:4 in Its Hellenistic Context, Coniectanea Biblica: New Testament Series 33 (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2000). Starr, Sharers, 239. Starr also argues for the philosophic background of the text: “2 Peter 1:4 may unhesitatingly be said to belong to this ancient teleological moral tradition reflected in the Old Testament, Josephus, Philo, Plutarch, the 208 Daniel Joseph Gordon in this third category with Starr, between Wolters and Kümmel. Besides showing how one can reconcile the covenantal and Hellenistic readings of 2 Peter 1:4, the exegesis of Aquinas also has the advantage of bringing a distinctly philosophical and theological perspective to scriptural exegesis, as opposed to an exclusively historical approach to the text. How does such an approach bear fruit in the writings of Aquinas? First, especially over the course of the Summa theologiae, Saint Thomas cites 2 Peter 1:4 in relation to some of the most important aspects of his teaching on grace, as if placing a seal on the discussion.9 He would thus seem to indicate that the verse contains his whole teaching on grace in a nutshell.10 Second, in his scriptural commentaries, Saint Thomas explains 2 Peter 1:4 especially in terms of Christ and the Trinity, suggesting that to become a partaker of the divine nature is effected through the salvific action of Christ and finds its end in a personal relationship with the Trinity.11 Third, in a way that clarifies how one enters into such a relationship with the Trinity, Saint Thomas unfolds 2 Peter 1:4, especially the notion of “partaking,” in terms of (a) participatio, which connects the exegesis conceptually and terminologically to notions of (b) assimilatio and confor- 9 10 11 Stoics, and Paul” (238). For another interpretation using philosophical categories in the interpretation of 2 Pet 1:4, see Wyndy Corbin-Reuschling, “The Means and End in 2 Peter 1:3–11: The Theological and Moral Significance of Theōsis,” Journal of Theological Interpretation 8, no. 2 (2014): 275–86. For instance, Thomas cites 2 Pet 1:4 in his discussion of the intrinsic principles of human action (regarding the habits, theological virtues, and grace), as well as in his consideration of Christ (considering his assumption and priesthood, as the mediating source of grace). For examples of this pattern of citation, see ST I-II, q. 50, a. 2 (on the subject of habits); q. 62, a. 1 (on the theological virtues); a. 3 (on the essence of grace); a. 4 (as referencing our participation in the divine nature, knowledge, and love); III, q. 3, a. 4, ad 3 (on Christ’s assumption of a human nature); q. 22, a. 1 (on the priesthood of Christ); and q. 62, a. 1 (on the sacraments as instrumental causes of grace). The reason for this use of the verse, as a scriptural seal or pendant on his teaching on grace, is perhaps because he associates the verse with gratia gratum faciens, the root of the whole life of grace (virtues, acts, gifts, and so on). Interestingly, he often cites 2 Pet 1:4 in a broader context—for example, in reference to habitual grace or the theological virtues—as if taking the verse to refer to the whole life of grace as well as specific parts of it. See: Super Ioan 15, lec. 2 (no. 1999); Super Rom 1, lec. 4 (no. 72); Super Eph 3, lec. 5 (no. 185); Super Tit 3, lec. 1 (no. 92); Super Hebr 8 lec. 2 (no. 392). The discussion of the scriptural commentaries add historical and interpersonal dimensions to the exegesis of 2 Pet 1:4, which, while not entirely lacking in the Summa theologiae, are perhaps less prominent than in the commentaries. Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 209 matio in relation to the divine missions, and (c) repraesentatio and imitatio in relation to the image of God. Overall, Saint Thomas offers a philosophically and theologically informed exegesis of the verse, spliced into his theological syntheses and scriptural commentaries, which shows how philosophic categories such as participatio, assimilatio, and repraesentatio do not obscure or diminish the rational creature’s personal relationship with God but clarify this relationship and explain the basis for its very possibility. Thomas highlights these personal dimensions of the life of grace and glory in his theological syntheses and especially in his scriptural commentaries. He thus harmonizes the Hellenistic and covenantal readings of 2 Peter 1:4, mutually exclusive positions which nevertheless agree in holding that the verse cannot be understood in both ways. This study will argue for the three conclusions above in the following order. The first section prefaces the discussion with a consideration of the verse itself, especially the notion of consors/koinōnos in the Latin writings of Aquinas and in its Greek scriptural milieu. The second section examines where and how Saint Thomas explicitly cites 2 Peter 1:4 across his theological corpus, focusing especially on the Summa (conclusion 1) and the scriptural commentaries (conclusion 2). The third section (conclusion 3) continues the explanation of the verse in terms of participatio, assimilatio/ conformatio, and repraesentatio/imitatio. The Scriptural Background of 2 Peter 1:4 To place 2 Peter 1:4 in context, we will consider the text as it appears in Scripture and in the writings of Thomas Aquinas. The Angelic Doctor, of course, was working from some version of the Latin Vulgate. Although we do not have an exact reconstruction of the text he used, given that he probably worked from many, and from his memory, we can make a few conjectures.12 One relevant citation of 2 Peter 1:4, which Thomas makes in ST I-II, q. 110, a. 3, reads as follows: “maxima et pretiosa nobis promissa donavit, ut per haec efficiamini divinae consortes naturae.” Thus: “He has given us the greatest and most precious promises, that through these we 12 On the role of memory in medieval thought, see the classic study from Mary J. Carruthers, The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature 10 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990). See also Carruthers, The Craft of Thought: Meditation, Rhetoric, and the Making of Images, 400–1200, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature 34 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998). 210 Daniel Joseph Gordon might be made partakers [consortes] of the divine nature.”13 Thomas almost certainly would have been familiar with the relational tone of the verse in question. After all, the Latin term consors in the singular (koinōnos in the Greek of the New Testament) denotes a sharing, partaking, or participating, and can thus come to signify a colleague, partner, and even heir.14 The Latin term socius, which the covenantal reading of the verse implies, is thus well within the semantic range of consors, as the Vulgate translates koinōnos in 2 Peter 1:4. The exegesis which Saint Thomas offers suggests that he understood, and indeed emphasized, the interpersonal aspect of the text and its importance for understanding the relationship between God and man. Significantly, the Clementine Vulgate renders the Greek term koinōnos as socius in all but three cases in the New Testament.15 The exceptions to the consors–koinōnos translation pattern are 2 Corinthians 8:18 (particeps renders koinōnos), 1 Peter 5:1 (communicator renders koinōnos), and 2 13 14 15 The Clementine Vulgate has the same reading (divinae consortes naturae) as well as the Weber-Gryson critical edition (divinae consortes naturae). The text of the verse therefore seem well-established. For the most scholarly recension of the Vulgate, see Robert Weber and Roger Gryson, eds., Biblia sacra Vulgata, 5th ed. (Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2007). One can access a free edition of the Clementine Vulgate, based on the Editio Typica (1598), at the “Clementine Vulgate Project,” vulsearch.sourceforge.net. See A Latin Dictionary, ed. Charles T. Lewis and Charles Short (Oxford: Clarendon, 2002), s.v. consors. See also Albert Wolters, “Postscript to ‘Partners of the Deity,’” Calvin Theological Journal 26, no. 2 (1991): 418–20: “As we would expect of a word used to describe the relationship of believers to God in the covenant, κοινωνός does not imply equality of status on the part of the covenant partners. It should be borne in mind that κοινωνός in the Hellenistic Greek of the Roman period often reflects the Latin legal term socius, which was frequently used of partners of quite different social standing, so that even a slave could be the socius of a high-ranking free man.” Here is the full text of 2 Pet 1:3–4, from the 28th ed. (2012) of the Nestle-Aland Greek New Testament, with the key phrase in italics: “[3] Ὡς πάντα ἡμῖν τῆς θείας δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ τὰ πρὸς ζωὴν καὶ εὐσέβειαν δεδωρημένης διὰ τῆς ἐπιγνώσεως τοῦ καλέσαντος ἡμᾶς ἰδίᾳ δόξῃ καὶ ἀρετῇ [4] δι’ ὧν τὰ τίμια καὶ μέγιστα ἡμῖν ἐπαγγέλματα δεδώρηται, ἵνα διὰ τούτων γένησθε θείας κοινωνοὶ φύσεως ἀποφυγόντες τῆς ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ φθορᾶς.” On the ambiguous syntax of 2 Pet 1, see Terrance Callan, “The Syntax of 2 Peter 1:1–7,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 67, no. 4 (2005): 632–40. The full text of 2 Pet 1:3–4, from the Clementine Vulgate, with the key phrase in italics, reads: “[3] Quomodo omnia nobis divinæ virtutis suæ, quæ ad vitam et pietatem donata sunt, per cognitionem eius, qui vocavit nos propria gloria, et virtute, [4] per quem maxima, et pretiosa nobis promissa donavit: ut per hæc efficiamini divinæ consortes naturæ: fugientes eius, quæ in mundo est, concupiscentiæ corruptionem.” Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 211 Peter 1:4 (consors renders koinōnos).16 The use of the term socius in the New Testament thus italicizes the relational implications of 2 Peter 1:4, as does the connotation of consors itself. In addition, koinōnos is related to koinōnia (communion), which indicates the relational basis of the word.17 The term koinōnos thus carries strong relational overtones, although it is juxtaposed with the language of the “divine nature” (theias physeōs), a phrase with more philosophical valences. Using this linguistic contextualization of 2 Peter 1:4 as a frame of reference, we can turn to Aquinas with a sense of the interpretative stakes. Some Hellenistic interpretations of the verse emphasize the philosophic tone of the text, whereas the covenantal interpretation highlights the interpersonal quality of the text. In his own exegesis, carried out over his career, Saint Thomas deftly synthesizes both the Hellenistic and covenantal resonances of the term. This insight into the meaning of the passage allows him to deploy the verse in a nuanced way. It is thus no surprise that the Common Doctor esteems this text, which seems to capture the spiritual transformation of the human person that accompanies a personal relationship with God. 16 17 The term koinōnos appears often in the New Testament. The Vulgate often translates koinōnos in terms of socius: see Mt 23:30 (“If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them [koinōnoi/socii eorum] in shedding the blood of the prophets.”); Lk 5:10 (“. . . and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners [koinōnoi/socii] with Simon”); 1 Cor 10:20 (“I do not want you to be partners [koinōnous/socios] with demons”); 2 Cor 1:7 (“For we know that as you share [koinōnoi/socii . . . estis] in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort”); 2 Cor 8:18 (“Consider the people of Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices partners [koinōnoi/participes] in the altar?”); 2 Cor 8:23 (“As for Titus, he is my partner [koinōnos/socius meus] and fellow worker in your service”); Phlm 17 (“So if you consider me your partner [koinōnon/socium], receive him as you would receive me”); Heb 10:32–33 (“you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to abuse and affliction, and sometimes being partners [koinōnoi/socii] with those so treated”); 1 Pet 5:1 (“So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ as well as a partaker [koinōnos/communicator] in the glory that is to be revealed”). See A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, ed. William Arndt, Frederick W. Danker, and Walter Bauer, 3rd ed. [BDAG] (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), s.v. κοινωνία: a “close association involving mutual interests and sharing, association, communion, fellowship, close relationship (hence a favorite expr. for the marital relationship as the most intimate betw. human beings . . .)” (p. 552). 212 Daniel Joseph Gordon Explicit Citations of 2 Peter 1:4 in the Thomistic Corpus In this section, we will review explicit citations of 2 Peter 1:4 in the writings of Saint Thomas. The majority of these quotations come in the Summa theologiae, but he also refers to the text in the Scriptum on the Sentences, in the Summa contra gentiles, in five of his scriptural commentaries, once in his Quaestio disputata de anima, and in his commentary on the Apostle’s Creed. He thus engages the text throughout his career, and it seems to take on greater importance for him, not less, as he progresses to his mature works and scriptural commentaries. The goal here is not merely to string together texts from disparate locations. Rather, looking at the texts together, the aim is to see how Thomas, especially in the Summa theologiae, unfolds the meaning of the verse not in any one location but across the development of the entire Summa, such that the passage takes on new associations depending on the context, much like a leitmotif reoccurring in the movements of a symphony. The scriptural commentaries are also important in tying the verse to the mystery of the Trinity and the action of Christ. Taking these texts together, one can glean how Thomas offers a profound and careful interpretation of 2 Peter 1:4 from the beginning of his career to the end, drawing it into his synthesis of faith and reason. The Mature Teaching in the Summa theologiae Saint Thomas develops his exegesis of 2 Peter 1:4 throughout the Summa theologiae. One can appreciate his systematic interpretation of the verse only by comparing the disparate citations of the passage, identifying their contexts, and highlighting the wider significance of each. In this light, references to participation in the divine nature show how man is ordered to and arrives at God. We will proceed to examine references to the verse, from the beginning of the Summa to the end, to better understand how Thomas interprets the verse within a wider theological framework. In the prima pars, Thomas first deploys the verse in an objection on the divine names, specifically on whether the name “God” is communicable (communicabile). The first objection of ST I, q. 13, a. 9, argues that the name is communicable because men can become partakers of the divine nature. This objection explicitly cites 2 Peter 1:4 in support of the position.18 However, Thomas clarifies that “the divine nature is not commu18 “Cuicumque enim communicatur res significata per nomen, communicatur et nomen ipsum. Sed hoc nomen Deus, ut dictum est, significat divinam naturam, quae est communicabilis aliis, secundum illud II Pet. I, magna et pretiosa promissa nobis donavit, ut per hoc efficiamur divinae consortes naturae. Ergo hoc nomen Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 213 nicable except according to the participation of a likeness [secundum similitudinis participationem].”19 In the corpus, he unpacks the notion of likeness: “Properly speaking, [a name] is communicable which according to the whole signification of the name is communicable to many. But [a name] is communicable through a likeness [per similitudinem] which is communicable according to some of those things which are included in the meaning of the name.”20 He also notes that “this name God is in no way communicable according to its whole signification, but according to something of it, through a certain likeness [similitudinem].”21 Thomas thus affirms that something of God is communicated to man by way of a likeness, but we are left wondering exactly which aspect of the “name” of God is communicated and in what way. Saint Thomas will answer these questions more precisely in the discussion on grace in the prima secundae, especially in question 110.22 In the prima secundae, while discussing the intrinsic principles of human action, Thomas asks whether habit is in the essence of the soul or in its powers, in the course of which he responds that, “if we speak about some higher nature, of which man can be a partaker [particeps], according to that saying of 2 Peter 1, ‘that we may be made sharers [consortes] of the divine nature,’ then nothing prevents there being some habit [habitum] in the soul according to its essence, namely grace, as will be shown later,”23 19 20 21 22 23 Deus est communicabile”—“For to whatever is communicated the thing signified by the name, the name itself is also communicated. But this name God, as was said, signifies the divine nature, which is communicable to others, according to 2 Pet 1:4: great and precious are the promises he gave to us, that through this we should be made consorts of the divine nature.” It is interesting that 2 Pet 1:4 first appears in the Summa as an objection. ST I, q. 13, a. 9, ad 1: “Natura divina non est communicabilis nisi secundum similitudinis participationem.” ST I, q. 13, a. 9: “Proprie quidem communicabile est, quod secundum totam significationem nominis, est communicabile multis. Per similitudinem autem communicabile est, quod est communicabile secundum aliquid eorum quae includuntur in nominis significatione.” ST I, q. 13, a. 9: “Est nihilominus communicabile hoc nomen Deus, non secundum suam totam significationem, sed secundum aliquid eius, per quandam similitudinem, ut dii dicantur, qui participant aliquid divinum per similitudinem, secundum illud, ego dixi, dii estis”—“. . . as they are called God who partake of something divine through a likeness, according to that passage, ‘I have said, you are gods (Ps 82:6).” Thomas, of course, will also give the beginning of an answer in his question on the divine missions and the rational creature’s assimilation to the divine persons through acts of knowing and loving in ST I, q. 43. ST I-II, q. 50, a. 2: “Sed si loquamur de aliqua superiori natura, cuius homo potest 214 Daniel Joseph Gordon perhaps indicating ST I-II, q. 110. The verse also appears in a discussion on the theological virtues, this time referring not to a habitus perfecting the essence of the soul, but to one perfecting the powers: “There is another beatitude exceeding the nature of man, toward which man is able to come by the divine power alone, according to a certain participation of divinity, as it is said in 2 Peter 1, ‘that through Christ we are made partakers of the divine nature.’”24 In these cases, Thomas draws out 2 Peter 1:4 to show more precisely how man becomes a partaker of the divine nature: by habitual grace, as qualifying the essence of his soul, and by the theological virtues, as qualifying the powers of his soul. Another reference to 2 Peter 1:4 in the prima secundae comes in the discussion of the essence of grace and makes more explicit the insights of I-II, q. 50, a. 2, and I-II, q. 62, a. 1, just noted above. Thus, in ST I-II, q. 110, a. 3, Thomas references 2 Peter 1:4, connecting consors with participatio, arguing that habitual grace is not the same as the infused virtues: The infused virtues dispose man in a higher way and for a higher end; so it is also necessary that [they dispose him] in relation to a higher nature. And this is for partaking of the divine nature [ad naturam divinam participatam], as is said in 2 Peter 1: “Great and precious are the promises he gave, that through these we may be made partakers of the divine nature [divinae consortes naturae].” 24 esse particeps, secundum illud II Petr. I, ut simus consortes naturae divinae, sic nihil prohibet in anima secundum suam essentiam esse aliquem habitum, scilicet gratiam, ut infra dicetur.” ST I-II, q. 62, a. 1: “Alia autem est beatitudo naturam hominis excedens, ad quam homo sola divina virtute pervenire potest, secundum quandam divinitatis participationem; secundum quod dicitur II Petr. I, quod per Christum facti sumus consortes divinae naturae.” Note how Thomas modifies the scriptural text to saying that we are made partakers through Christ, rather than through the “most precious promises” of Christ. In this article, Thomas also draws a distinction between two ways in which a thing can have a nature, essentially and by participation: “Ad primum ergo dicendum quod aliqua natura potest attribui alicui rei dupliciter. Uno modo, essentialiter, et sic huiusmodi virtutes theologicae excedunt hominis naturam. Alio modo, participative, sicut lignum ignitum participat naturam ignis, et sic quodammodo fit homo particeps divinae naturae, ut dictum est. Et sic istae virtutes conveniunt homini secundum naturam participatam”—“With regard to the first objection, it must be said that some nature can be attributed to something in two ways. In one way, essentially, and the theological virtues in this way exceed the nature of man. In another way, by participation, just as burning wood participates in the nature of fire; and, thus, in some way, man is made a partaker of the divine nature, as was said. And so these virtues belong to man according to participated nature” (I-II, q. 62, a. 1, ad 1). Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 215 And by the reception of this nature, we are said to be regenerated [regenerari] into sons of God.25 Thomas thus directly links the notion of participatio with the consortes of 2 Peter 1:4. The participation accomplished through the grace of God, making the graced human into a consors, that is, a sharer, or even partner, of the divine nature, suggests the relational aspect of graced participation in the divine nature. The reference to regeneration into sons of God (filii Dei) confirms the relational dynamism of participation: its goal is a filial relationship with God. In article 4 of question 110, the interpenetration of the philosophical and theological, arguably already present in the text of 2 Peter 1:4, appears even more clearly. Having argued that grace is a participation in the divine nature in the prior articles, in reference to habitual grace, Thomas expands his position, extending the graced participation in God to knowledge and love: For just as by the intellective power man participates the divine knowledge [participat cognitionem divinam] through the virtue of faith, and [just as] by the power of the will [he participates] the divine love [amorem divinum] through the virtue of charity, so also through the nature of the soul he participates, according to a certain similitude, the divine nature [participat . . . naturam divinam], through a certain regeneration or recreation.26 The participation of man in the divine nature thus has its roots in the participation of the soul in the divine nature through habitual grace. In addition, the human person participates in the divine knowledge and love through the virtues of faith and charity, growing out of habitual grace as 25 26 ST I-II, q. 110, a. 3: “Virtutes autem infusae disponunt hominem altiori modo, et ad altiorem finem, unde etiam oportet quod in ordine ad aliquam altiorem naturam. Hoc autem est in ordine ad naturam divinam participatam; secundum quod dicitur II Petr. I, ‘maxima et pretiosa nobis promissa donavit, ut per haec efficiamini divinae consortes naturae.’ Et secundum acceptionem huius naturae, dicimur regenerari in filios Dei.” In the corpus of the same article, Thomas also notes that “the light of grace . . . is a participation in the divine nature” (“lumen gratiae, quod est participatio divinae naturae”). ST I-II, q. 110, a. 4: “Sicut enim per potentiam intellectivam homo participat cognitionem divinam per virtutem fidei; et secundum potentiam voluntatis amorem divinum, per virtutem caritatis; ita etiam per naturam animae participat, secundum quandam similitudinem, naturam divinam, per quandam regenerationem sive recreationem.” Thomas does not here cite 2 Peter 1:4, but he does so in the previous article. The use of similar language (participatio, regeneratio) in a similar context suggests a link between articles 3 and 4 of question 110. 216 Daniel Joseph Gordon from a root, as these virtues qualify the intellect and will.27 In his earlier discussion of the divine missions, Saint Thomas draws this line of thought to its logical conclusion: we become like God not only through the gift of habitual grace and the theological virtues but also in our graced actions, that is, in our very acts of knowing and loving the divine persons in their distinction.28 The tertia pars contains the next reference to the verse, excepting its quotation in an objection from the secunda secundae.29 Discussing the difference between assumption through hypostatic union and assumption through grace, Thomas states that “the assumption which is made through the grace of adoption is terminated toward a certain participation [participatio] of the divine nature according to an assimilation [assimilatio] of its divine goodness, according to 2 Peter 1, ‘as consorts of the divine nature,’ etc. And therefore the mode of assumption of this kind [namely, one through grace] is common to the three persons both on the part of the principles and on the part of the terminus.”30 To be a consors thus involves the grace of adoption, being made a son or daughter of God, which Thomas connects with participatio and assimilatio. Finally, in an article on the priesthood of Christ, after quoting a string of passages (Mal 2:7, Heb 5:1, and Col 1:19), Thomas observes that “the proper office of a priest is to be a mediator between God and the people, 27 28 29 30 In God, nature, intellect, and will, as well as the exercise of these acts, are all one. In contrast, man’s nature, intellect, and will, as well as the habits, acts, and objects of these powers, are distinct. What is therefore simple in God is reflected in a manifold way in the human person. The human person thus mirrors God in a multifaceted way. On this point, see the final section of the present study. Thomas prefers to use the word assimilatio rather than participatio or consortio in his consideration of human acts of knowing and loving vis-à-vis the divine persons. Thomas directly links the notions of participatio and assimilatio in ST III, q. 3, a. 4, ad 3, discussed below. For the noted exception, see ST II-II, q. 85, a. 2, obj. 1: “Cum enim sacrificium Deo offerri debeat, videtur quod omnibus illis sit sacrificium offerendum qui divinitatis consortes fiunt. Sed etiam sancti homines efficiuntur divinae naturae consortes, ut dicitur II Petri I”—“For since sacrifice ought to be offered to God, it seems that a sacrifice must be offered for all those who would be made consorts of the divinity. But holy men are also made consorts of the divine nature, as is said in 2 Pet 1:4.” ST III, q. 3, a. 4, ad 3: “Assumptio quae fit per gratiam adoptionis, terminatur ad quandam participationem divinae naturae secundum assimilationem ad bonitatem illius, secundum illud II Pet. I, ut divinae consortes naturae, etc. Et ideo huiusmodi assumptio communis est tribus personis et ex parte principii et ex parte termini.” Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 217 namely, inasmuch as he brings divine things to the people. . . . And this belongs above all to Christ. For through him gifts were brought to men, according to 2 Peter 1, ‘through whom,’ namely Christ, ‘he gave to us the greatest and most precious promises, that through these we might be made partakers of the divine nature.’”31 Participation in the divine nature thus has a Christological basis and character, with Saint Thomas tracing the source of the gifts to Christ as high priest, through whom they are given to men, as noted in 2 Peter 1:4.32 Finally, Thomas connects 2 Peter 1:4 with the sacraments of Christ, noting how God alone can cause grace, since “grace is nothing other than a certain participated similitude of the divine nature, according that verse of 2 Peter 1.”33 Thomas therefore fittingly connects 2 Peter 1:4 not only with the humanity of Christ the priest, a conjoined instrument of the Word, but also links the verse to the sacraments, the gifts of Christ the high priest 31 32 33 ST III, q. 22, a. 1: “proprium officium sacerdotis est esse mediatorem inter Deum et populum, inquantum scilicet divina populo tradit. . . . Hoc autem maxime convenit Christo. Nam per ipsum dona hominibus sunt collata, secundum illud II Pet. I, per quem, scilicet Christum, maxima et pretiosa nobis promissa donavit, ut per haec efficiamini divinae consortes naturae.” The scriptural texts Thomas cites are Mal 2:7 (“For the lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and men should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the lord of hosts”), Heb 5:1 (“For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins”), and Col 1:19–20 (“For in him all the fulness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross”). See also the discussion of ST III, q. 62, a. 1, in the section on participation below (see note 61 below). The link between Christ, participation, and grace, especially in relation to 2 Pet 1:4, comes out in the fact that Thomas often quotes the phrase differently. Sometimes he writes per haec, referring to the great and precious promises, but other times he prefers per ipsum, per hoc, and even per Christum, suggesting that he reads the text, and the whole notion of our graced participation in God, against a Christological background. In the same article (ST III, q. 22, a. 1, ad 3), Saint Thomas also refers to the grace of headship (“Christ, as the head of all, has the perfection of all graces”), reminding us of the fuller discussion of the topic in ST III, q. 8. He also states that “Christ was greater than the angels, not only according to his divinity, but also according to his humanity inasmuch as he had the fullness [plenitudinem] of grace and glory” (III, q. 22, a. 1, ad 1). He thus first states that Christ has the fullness of grace (ad 1) and then mentions his grace of headship (ad 3), suggesting, in the context of his discussion of 2 Pet 1:4, how Christ, in his humanity, is the mediator of all graces to men. ST III, q. 62, a. 1 (see note 61 below). 218 Daniel Joseph Gordon and separated instrumental causes of God that allow humans to partake of the divine life through their journey on earth.34 These citations of 2 Peter 1:4, taken from across the Summa theologiae, have a certain coherence and logic to them. In the prima pars, Thomas alludes to how participation in the divine nature makes us like God, insofar as “something” of the meaning of the name of God is communicable to us according to a “likeness” (see ST I, q. 13, a. 9, on the names of God). In the prima secundae, while discussing the intrinsic principles of human action, he more precisely describes this participated likeness, identifying grace as the cause of the likeness, observing how grace can modify the essence of the soul (see ST I-II, q. 50, a. 2, on the subject of habits) as well as the powers of the soul (see ST I-II, q. 62, a. 1, on the theological virtues), making us partakers of the divine nature in both ways. Even more specifically, one shares in the divine nature through habitual grace, in the divine knowledge through faith, and in the divine love through charity, and in so doing is “regenerated” into a son of God (see ST I-II, q. 110, aa. 3–4 on the essence of grace). Finally, Thomas identifies Christ as the source of grace, the “priest” and “mediator” between God and men, showing how Christ is the principle of our “assimilation” to the divine goodness (see ST III, q. 3, a. 4, ad 3, on the mode of union and q. 22, a. 1, on the priesthood of Christ). God communicates this grace to man, here and now, through the separated instruments of the sacraments (see ST III, q. 62, a. 1, on the sacraments as instrumental causes of grace). Thus, the guiding light of the Thomasian exegesis of 2 Peter 1:4 seems to be the patristic refrain, cited from at least Irenaeus onward, but not explicitly mentioned by Saint Thomas in the passages discussed above, that God became man so that man might become like God.35 34 35 On the sacraments as mirroring the journey of life, and providing for its spiritual needs, from birth to death, see ST III, q. 65, a. 1: “Vita enim spiritualis conformitatem aliquam habet ad vitam corporalem”—“For spiritual life has some conformity to bodily life.” Thomas cites this patristic insight prominently in ST III, q. 1, a. 2, as the fifth, culminating reason why the Son of God became incarnate, linking it to participation: “Fifth, [God became man] as much as to the full participation of the divinity, which truly is the happiness of man. And this is arranged for us through the humanity of Christ, for Augustine says . . . God was made man that man might be made God” (“Quinto, quantum ad plenam participationem divinitatis, quae vere est hominis beatitudo, et finis humanae vitae. Et hoc collatum est nobis per Christi humanitatem, dicit enim Augustinus . . . factus est Deus homo, ut homo fieret Deus”). See also Super Eph 3, lec. 5 (no. 185): “Nam nec affectus, nec intellectus humanus potuissent considerare, vel intelligere, vel petere a Deo quod fieret homo et homo efficeretur Deus et consors naturae divinae”—“For neither Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 219 Scriptural Commentaries: John, Romans, Ephesians, Titus, and Hebrews References to 2 Peter 1:4 in the scriptural commentaries of Aquinas root the passage deeper in Scripture and fill out what might appear to be the more abstract explanations of the Summa.36 Thomas refers to 2 Peter 1:4 in his commentaries on the Gospel of John and Paul’s letters to the Romans, Ephesians, Titus, and Hebrews. These references demonstrate that Thomas understands 2 Peter 1:4 in light of the Trinity as well as the priestly mediation of Christ. The scriptural commentaries thus add an interpersonal dimension to his exegesis of the verse. In the commentary on John, Thomas glosses a passage in the Farewell Discourse, before the Passion of the Lord, reminding his disciples that, “as the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love” (John 15:9). Thomas then notes that Christ did not love his disciples “that they would be God by nature,” nor that “they would be united to God in person,” but rather “he loved them toward [ad] a certain likeness of these, such that, namely, they would be gods by participation through grace,” after which he quotes 2 Peter 1:4.37 The passage thus underscores the divine love as the principle of our union with God through participation in grace.38 Thomas also comments on this passage from Romans: “To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom 1:7). After 36 37 38 affection nor human understanding was able to consider or to understand or to seek from God that he should become man and that man should be made God and a consort of the divine nature.” For one of the earliest references to this notion, see Irenaeus, Adversus haereses 3.19.1: “Propter hoc enim Verbum Dei homo, et qui Filius Dei est Filius hominis factus est, [ut homo], commixtus Verbo Dei et adoptionem percipiens, fiat filius Dei” (ed. A. Rousseau and L. Doutreleau, Sources Chrétiennes 211 [Paris: Cerf, 1974])—“For on account of this the Word of God became man and he who was the Son of God was made a son of man, that man, mingled with the Word of God and recognizing the adoption, should be made a son of God.” On the scriptural commentaries of Aquinas, see Weinandy, Keating, and Yocum, Aquinas on Scripture. A fuller discussion of the passages cited below, in their proper context, would require an additional study. Super Ioan 15, lec. 2 (no. 1999): “Et ad nihil horum filius dilexit discipulos, nam neque ad hoc dilexit eos ut essent Deus per naturam, neque essent uniti Deo in persona; sed ad quamdam horum similitudinem eos dilexit, ut scilicet essent dii per participationem gratiae; Ps. LXXXI, 6: ego dixi: dii estis; II Petr. I, 4: per quem magna nobis et pretiosa promissa donavit, ut divinae per hoc efficiamur consortes naturae” (emphasis added). On this point, see also ST I, q. 20, on the love of God, which contextualizes the teaching on grace. 220 Daniel Joseph Gordon noting that the phrase “from God our Father” can be taken “essentially for the whole Trinity,” Thomas observes that Paul adds “and our Lord Jesus Christ” not because he is another person but “on account of his human nature through the mystery of which [per cuius mysterium] the gifts of graces come to us,” connecting these gifts of grace with our being made partakers of the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4).39 The mystery of grace40 is thus placed in a Trinitarian and Christological context: grace comes from the entire Trinity as mediated by the mystery of the humanity of Christ, thereby leading man back to the Trinity through Christ.41 In Ephesians, Thomas comments on the following text: “Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, to him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, for ever and ever. Amen” (Eph 3:20–21). As an example of this “abundance” (abundantia), Saint Thomas observes that “neither human affect nor human understanding would have been able to consider or to understand or to seek from God that he should become man and that man should be made God and a consort of the divine nature, which nevertheless he works in us according to power, and this in the Incarna39 40 41 Super Rom 1, lec. 4 (no. 72): “Quod autem dicit Deo patre nostro, potest teneri essentialiter pro tota Trinitate, quae dicitur pater, quia nomina importantia relationem ad creaturam, communia sunt toti Trinitati, sicut creator et dominus. Addit autem et domino Iesu Christo, non quod sit alia persona a tribus, sed propter humanam naturam, per cuius mysterium ad nos dona gratiarum perveniunt. II Petr. c. I, 4: per quem maxima et pretiosa nobis promissa donavit. Vel potest dici quod hoc quod dicit Deo patre nostro, tenetur pro persona patris, quae secundum proprietatem dicitur pater Christi, sed secundum appropriationem pater noster”—“And when he says ‘to God our Father,’ it can be taken essentially for the whole Trinity, which is called Father; for names implying a relation to creatures are common to the whole Trinity, just as Creator and Lord. And he adds ‘to the Lord Jesus Christ’ not that he is another person from the three but on account of the human nature, through whose mystery gifts of grace should come to us, ‘through which he gave the most great and precious promises to us.’ Or it can be said that what he says, ‘to God our Father,’ is taken for the person of the Father, which according to his property is called the Father of Christ, but according to appropriation, our Father.” One might be tempted, perhaps not incorrectly, to read mysterium here (“propter humanam naturam, per cuius mysterium ad nos dona gratiarum perveniunt”) in terms of sacramentum. In the context of the rest of his exegesis in the scriptural commentaries, the reference to the “Father” as being taken “essentially” for the whole Trinity would seem to imply that all of the divine persons are present in the work of our sanctification. Where God is at work, so are each of the divine persons, for each is God. Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 221 tion of his Son [quoting 2 Peter 1:4: per hoc efficiamini].”42 So, again, to be a partaker of the divine nature comes about through the mystery of the Incarnation and the power of God at work within us. In the commentary on Titus, Thomas comments on this text: “But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of deeds done by us in righteousness, but in virtue of his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Tit 3:4–6). Thomas here notes that man in the state of perdition needed both to be restored to a participation in the divine nature and to put off the old man, which occurs in such a way that “this [new] nature is so given that our nature also remains, and thus it is added above [it]. For in this way a participation in the Son of God is generated, by which man is not destroyed.”43 Participation in the divine is thus portrayed as a participation in the Son of God (participatio in the Filium Dei). In regard to Hebrews, Thomas comments on the following: “But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry which is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises” (Heb 8:6). The reference here to “promises” and mediation links Hebrews with 2 Peter 1:4. Thomas observes that “every priest is a mediator. And this one is the mediator of a better covenant, namely, of man to God. For it belongs to a mediator to reconcile extremes. And this one bears divine [things] to us, for through him [per ipsum] we are made partakers of the divine nature, as is said in 2 Peter 1. He also offers us to God.”44 The 42 43 44 Super Eph 3, lec. 5 (no. 185): “Nam nec affectus, nec intellectus humanus potuissent considerare, vel intelligere, vel petere a Deo quod fieret homo et homo efficeretur Deus et consors naturae divinae, quae tamen secundum virtutem operatur in nobis, et hoc in incarnatione filii sui. II Petr. I, 4: ut per hoc efficiamini divinae consortes naturae.” Super Tit 3, lect. 1 (no. 92): “Homo indigebat duobus in statu perditionis, quae consecutus est per Christum, scilicet participatione divinae naturae, et depositione vetustatis. . . . Sed primum consequimur per Christum, scilicet per participationem naturae divinae. I Pet. II [sic]: ut per hoc efficiamur consortes divinae naturae. Sed nova natura non acquiritur nisi per generationem. Sed tamen haec natura ita datur, quod etiam remanet nostra, et ita superadditur. Sic enim generatur participatio in filium Dei, quo non destruitur homo”—“In the state of perdition, man stood in need of two things, which Christ accomplished, namely, participation in the divine nature and the putting off of his old age. . . . But we accomplish the first through Christ, namely, by participation of the divine nature: ‘that through this we should be made consorts of the divine nature.’ This [new] nature is so given that our nature also remains . . .” Super Heb 8, lec. 2 (no. 392): “Deinde cum dicit quanto et melioris, etc. assignat 222 Daniel Joseph Gordon link between Christ, mediation, and priesthood is thus present here, as it is in ST III, q. 22, a. 1. All these texts demonstrate how Thomas connects participation in God with the person of Christ, who, as priest, is the mediator of the new covenant (Heb 8), and, as savior, pours out the gift of regeneration through the Holy Spirit (Tit 3:5). This “love of Christ which surpasses knowledge” (Eph 3:19) reveals the “power at work within us” (Eph 3:20) leading the believer to give glory to the Father in Christ Jesus (Eph 3:14–21). The biblical commentaries thus contextualize the notion of participation in the divine nature by setting it in Scripture: linking it to the love of God (John 15:9) and Christ (Eph 3:19), its origin in Christ (Rom 1:7), the priesthood of Christ (Heb 8:6), and the salvific power of God (Tit 3:4). References to the Father (Eph 3:14) and the Holy Spirit (Tit 3:5) also gesture at the Trinitarian dimension of graced participation, as does “God our Father,” which Thomas takes essentially for the Trinity, in Romans 1:7. The personal dimensions of 2 Peter 1:4 thus shine forth clearly in the exegesis of the scriptural commentaries. Additional Citations of 2 Peter 1:4 To conclude this exhibition of texts, Thomas also refers to 2 Peter 1:4 in his Scriptum, the Summa contra gentiles, the Quaestio disputata de anima, and in his commentary on the Apostle’s Creed. The earlier theological writings, such as the Scriptum, show that Thomas already invested some importance in 2 Peter 1:4. These citations also show how Thomas cited 2 Peter 1:4 across his career, in several genres, and in different registers (academic and popular). In the Scriptum, for example, Thomas connects the saying from 2 Peter 1:4, without a specific citation, to a discussion of confirmation in the good and divine sonship. Contrasting God’s confirmation in goodness to that of man, Thomas notes that “to whomever this is given, [namely,] that they should be confirmed in the good through grace, they have [this] through the gift of grace, through which they are made sons of God, and in a certain way consorts of the divine nature.”45 The reference to confirmation 45 causam quare ministerium hoc maius est. Omnis enim sacerdos mediator est. Iste autem mediator est melioris foederis, scilicet hominis ad Deum. Mediatoris enim est extrema conciliare. Iste vero ad nos divina attulit, quia per ipsum facti sumus divinae consortes naturae, ut dicitur II Pet. I, 4 [sic]. Ipse etiam nostra offert Deo”—“Next, when he says ‘how much and better,’ and so on, he assigns a cause on account of which this ministry is better. For every priest is a mediator . . .” In II sent., d. 23, q. 1, a. 1: “. . . et quibuscumque hoc confertur ut per gratiam Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 223 in goodness, a characteristic of the beatified saints, connects the notion of participation in God to the states of grace and glory. The first citation thus already indicates the notion of a journey from the present life to life everlasting.46 Thomas also refers to the verse in the Summa contra gentiles, but in this case to refute a position that Christ was merely adopted in grace, and not truly divine. The objectionable position holds that “through a certain assimilation to God he [Christ] is called God in the Scriptures not by nature, but through a certain sharing [consortium] of the divine goodness, just as it is said also of the saints in 2 Peter 1.”47 While denying this position, Thomas at a later point affirms that Christ, though God, is a partaker of the divine nature in his humanity through grace.48 These citations of 2 Peter 1:4, which Thomas does not develop systematically, nevertheless 46 47 48 confirmentur in bono, habent per donum gratiae, per quod filii Dei efficiuntur, et quodammodo divinae naturae consortes.” On language of participation in the Scriptum reminiscent of 2 Pet 1:4, see In II sent., d. 27, q. 1, a. 5, ad 3 (see note 62 below) and In III sent., d. 4, q. 3, a. 1: “Verum est quod nulla merita etiam aliorum, filii Dei incarnationem meruerunt, proprie loquendo, propter tres rationes. . . . Tertia ratio est, quia meritum humanum non se extendit ultra conditionem humanam, quae in hoc consistit ut quis mereatur aliquam divinitatis et beatitudinis participationem. Sed quod tota plenitudo divinitatis habitet in homine, hoc excedit et conditionem et meritum humanum”—“It is true that no merits of others merited the Incarnation of the Son of God, properly speaking, for three reasons. . . . The third reason is because human merit does not extend beyond the human condition, which consists in this, that someone should merit some participation of divinity and beatitude. But that the whole plenitude of the divinity should dwell in man exceeds both the human condition and human merit.” SCG IV, ch. 4, no. 3: “Opinantes Iesum Christum purum hominem esse . . . aestimaverunt eum, similiter aliis hominibus, per adoptionis spiritum Dei filium; et per gratiam ab eo genitum; et per quandam assimilationem ad Deum in Scripturis dici Deum, non per naturam, sed per consortium quoddam divinae bonitatis, sicut et de sanctis dicitur II Petr. 1: ut efficiamini divinae consortes naturae”—“Those supposing that Jesus Christ was merely a man . . . judged him, like other men, a son of God through the spirit of adoption; and begotten by him through grace, and through a certain assimilation to God . . .” ST III, q. 7, a. 1, ad 1: “Sed quia cum unitate personae remanet distinctio naturarum, ut ex supra dictis patet, anima Christi non est per suam essentiam divina. Unde oportet quod fiat divina per participationem, quae est secundum gratiam”—“But because with the unity of the person there remains a distinction of natures, as is clear from the words mentioned above, the soul of Christ is not by its essence divine. So it is necessary that it may be made divine by participation, which is according to grace.” 224 Daniel Joseph Gordon foreshadow how the theme of participation in the divine nature will influence his account of both man and Christ. In the Quaestio disputata de anima, Thomas asks whether an angel and soul differ with respect to species.49 In response to the objection, which notes that angels and men are each perfected by grace, glory, and charity, Thomas observes that “gratuitous perfections belong to the soul and to an angel through a participation of the divine nature, whence it is said in 2 Peter 1.”50 Here, Thomas sees 2 Peter 1:4 as summing up the “gratuitous perfections” given to men and angels. The verse thus functions in the disputed question, as it does in the Summa, as a sort of catchphrase summing up the graced life of men in relation to God both in via and in patria. Finally, commenting on article 3 of the Apostle’s Creed—“qui conceptus est de Spiritu Sancto, natus ex Maria Virgine”—Thomas observes that the Incarnation strengthens our faith, hope, and charity. The Incarnation also provides a reason to keep a pure soul (puram animam), Saint Thomas writes, “inasmuch as our nature was ennobled and exalted from union [coniunctio] with God, which was assumed [ fuit . . . suscepta] for a sharing [ad consortium] of a divine person,” later quoting 2 Peter 1:4.51 The text here, significantly, refers to the Incarnation itself as a kind of union (coni49 50 51 Quaes. disp. de an., q. 7: “Septimo quaeritur utrum Angelus et anima differant specie”—“Seventh, it is asked whether angel and soul differ in species.” Quaes. disp. de an., q. 7, ad 9: “Ad nonum dicendum quod perfectiones gratuitae conveniunt animae et Angelo per participationem divinae naturae; unde dicitur II Petri, I: per quem maxima et pretiosa nobis dona donavit, ut divinae naturae consortes, et cetera. Unde per convenientiam in istis perfectionibus non potest concludi unitas speciei”—“. . . whence it is said in 2 Peter 1: through whom he gave to us the most great and precious gifts, that we may be made consorts of the divine nature,’ and so on. So, the unity of the species cannot be concluded from agreement in these perfections.” In symbolum apostolorum, a. 3: “Quarto inducimur ad servandam puram animam nostram. Intantum enim natura nostra fuit nobilitata et exaltata ex coniunctione ad Deum, quod fuit ad consortium divinae personae suscepta. . . . Ideo homo huius exaltationem recolens et attendens, debet dedignari vilificare se et naturam suam per peccatum: ideo dicit beatus Petrus: per quem maxima et pretiosa nobis promissa donavit, ut per haec efficiamur divinae consortes naturae, fugientes eius quae in mundo est concupiscentiae corruptionem”—“Fourth, we are led to preserving our soul pure, inasmuch as our nature was ennobled and exalted from union with God, which was assumed for a sharing of a divine person. . . . Therefore, man, remembering and attending to the exultation of this, ought to disdain to debase himself and his nature though sin: therefore the blessed Peter says: ‘through whom he gave the most great and precious promises, that through these we should be made consorts of the divine nature.’” Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 225 unctio) and sharing (consortio) of a divine person, although perhaps the language here is more metaphorical, geared as it is toward a more popular audience. In any case, the idea is that Christ himself, as man, participates as a “partaker” in the divine nature.52 *** All these passages, from the Scriptum to the Summa to the scriptural commentaries, show how the meaning of 2 Peter 1:4 unfolds in the writings of Saint Thomas like an ever-deepening stream. The initial references in the Scriptum and Summa contra gentiles display how the verse is present at earlier stages of his thought. The systematic exposition of the verse from across the Summa theologiae shows how 2 Peter 1:4 contains the whole teaching on grace in embryo: some likeness of God is communicated to us through grace, qualifying the essence and powers of the soul, coming to fruition in the graced acts of knowledge and love of God, all of which is made possible through the mediation of the priesthood of Christ. A citation of 2 Peter 1:4 accompanies each stage of this development, as the teaching on grace deepens and broadens. Our “partaking” of the divine nature is thus totally enfolding: through our participation in the divine nature, by habitual grace, we are made apt to receive the theological virtues of faith and charity that bear fruit in the graced acts of knowing and loving God. The scriptural commentaries lend an even deeper personal dimension to the meaning of the verse, connecting 2 Peter 1:4 with the persons of the Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) and Christ in his humanity, the mediating source of grace for us. His exposition of 2 Peter 1:4 is thus conceptually sophisticated—as explained in terms of communicatio, habitual grace, the theological virtues, and priestly mediation—as well as historically grounded in the revelation of the Trinity and the salvific deeds of Jesus Christ. Textual Resonances: Grace as Participatio, Assimilatio, and Repraesentatio Thus far we have catalogued and reflected on many of the explicit references Thomas makes to 2 Peter 1:4. This analysis shows how Thomas connects 2 Peter 1:4 with his significant teachings on grace: from habitual grace, to the theological virtues, to graced human action.53 These refer52 53 Interestingly, although he connects 2 Pet 1:4 with a discussion of the Incarnation and adoption in grace, Thomas in the Summa does not seem to explicitly explain the humanity of Christ in terms of the verse. To my knowledge, Saint Thomas does not explicitly link 2 Peter 1:4 with his discussion of the grace of auxilium, the grace of God moving, reducing the 226 Daniel Joseph Gordon ences, while drawing out the implications of what it means to be made a partaker of the divine nature, do not yet exhaust the intellectual resources of the Angelic Doctor. We have already noted how Thomas explicitly links 2 Peter 1:4 with the notion of participatio.54 In so doing, Thomas also draws the verse into a constellation of ideas that include assimilatio and conformatio in reference to the Trinity as well as repraesentatio and imitatio in reference to man as imago Dei.55 The goal of this final section will be to trace the conceptual and terminological links from 2 Peter 1:4 to participation, divine mission, and the image of God. It will not be an exhaustive study of any one of these additional topics but will merely to gesture at the connections to suggest the implications and fecundity of the Thomasian exegesis. We will then see more clearly how the allegedly Hellenistic background of 2 Peter 1:4 does not compromise the personal and covenantal character of Christianity but actually upholds it. Grace as Participatio: A Philosophic Interpretation of “Partaking” As we have seen, in ST I-II, q. 110, on the essence of grace, Thomas connects 2 Peter 1:4 with the notion of participatio.56 He argues that we 54 55 56 human actor from potency to act. However, the discussion of auxilium, for example in ST I-II, q. 111, a. 2, is near other quotations of 2 Peter 1:4, such as those in q. 110. References in ST I-II, q. 50, a. 2 (see note 23 above), and q. 110, a. 3 (see note 25 above) explain 2 Pet 1:4 in terms of participatio. See also III, q. 3, a. 4, ad 3: “The assumption which is made through the grace of adoption is terminated in a certain participation [participatio] of the divine nature according to an assimilation [assimilatio] of its divine goodness, according to 2 Peter 1, as consorts of the divine nature.” See also Super Tit 3, lec. 1 (no. 92). See, for example, ST I, q. 43, a. 5, ad 2, on the divine missions (see note 71 below), and ST I, q. 93, a. 5, on the image of God (see notes 79, 82–83, and 86–89 below). See ST I-II, q. 110, a. 3 (note 25 above). For a recent discussion of participation in Aquinas that attempts to coordinate Platonic and Aristotelian elements in Thomas’s theology of creation, see Rudi te Velde, Participation and Substantiality in Thomas Aquinas, Studien und Texte zur Geistesgeschichte des Mittelalters 46 (Leiden: Brill, 1995). Two historically significant studies of participation in Thomas Aquinas are, of course, Cornelio Fabro, Partecipazione e causalità secondo S. Tommaso d’Aquino (Rome: EDIVI, 2010), and Louis-Bertrand Geiger, La participation dans la philosophie de s. Thomas d’Aquin, Bibliothèque thomiste 23 (Paris: Vrin, 1942). For a closer study of grace as a participation in the divine nature, especially in light of the three modes of participation, see Eitenmiller, “Grace as Participation.” On the Dionysian background of Thomistic metaphysics, see Fran O’Rourke, Pseudo-Dionysius and the Metaphysics of Aquinas (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005). Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 227 become partakers of the divine nature insofar as we participate in it. What exactly does Thomas mean by speaking of such a participation? More precisely, in what sense, and how, does grace make one a participant in the divine nature? Without studying the relation of gratia and participatio in the entire Thomistic corpus, we can contextualize ST I-II, q. 110, by considering other references to grace and participation in the Summa theologiae.57 For example, Thomas introduces the pair of grace and participation in his discussions of the final end of man (I, q. 24, a. 2, ad 3: on the book of life); the life of the angels (I, q. 106, a. 4: on how one creature moves another); and the old law’s insufficiency in relation to the new law (I-II, q. 98, a. 1: on the old law); and in relation to the gift of fear, the beginning of wisdom, and man’s order to his final end (II-II, q. 19, a. 7: on the gift of fear).58 These 57 58 Outside of the Summa, references to grace as a participation of the divine nature occur in the De veritate (e.g.: q. 27, a. 1, ad 7; q. 29, a. 1, ad 5; a. 3, ad 5; a. 5), in some scriptural commentaries, and elsewhere. The first citation connects participation with the final end of man, italicizing the goal-directed character of grace. See ST I, q. 24, a. 2, ad 3: “Et propter hoc, illi qui habent gratiam et excidunt a gloria, non dicuntur esse electi simpliciter, sed secundum quid. Et similiter non dicuntur esse scripti simpliciter in libro vitae sed secundum quid; prout scilicet de eis in ordinatione et notitia divina existit, quod sint habituri aliquem ordinem ad vitam aeternam, secundum participationem gratiae”—“And on account of this, those who have grace and fall short of glory are not said to be elected simply, but in a qualified way. And likewise they are not said to be written into the book of life simply, but in a qualified way—namely, as there exists in the divine knowledge and ordination that they are to have some relation to eternal life, according to a participation of grace.” ST I, q. 106, a. 4: “Quanto igitur aliqua agentia magis in participatione divinae bonitatis constituuntur, tanto magis perfectiones suas nituntur in alios transfundere, quantum possibile est. Unde beatus Petrus monet eos qui divinam bonitatem per gratiam participant, dicens, I Petr. IV, ‘unusquisque, sicut accepit gratiam, in alterutrum illam administrantes, sicut boni dispensatores multiformis gratiae Dei’”—“Therefore as much as some agents are established more in the participation of divine goodness, so much more do they strive to transfuse their perfections into others, as much as is possible. The blessed Peter thus admonishes those who participate in the divine goodness through grace, saying, ‘each one, just as he receives grace, ministering to one another, just as good dispensers of the multiform grace of God’ [1 Pet 4:10].” ST I-II, q. 98, a. 1: “Et ideo illud quod sufficit ad perfectionem legis humanae, ut scilicet peccata prohibeat et poenam apponat, non sufficit ad perfectionem legis divinae, sed oportet quod hominem totaliter faciat idoneum ad participationem felicitatis aeternae. Quod quidem fieri non potest nisi per gratiam spiritus sancti, per quam diffunditur caritas in cordibus nostris, quae legem adimplet, gratia enim Dei vita aeterna, ut dicitur Rom. VI”—“And therefore that which suffices for the perfection of human law, namely, that it should prohibit sins and 228 Daniel Joseph Gordon passages highlight how grace as participation is ordered toward the final life of glory. References to grace as a participation in the divine nature also abound in the tertia pars, especially in reference to the grace of Christ in his humanity. In asking whether the union of the Incarnation occurred through grace, Thomas observes that “grace, which is an accident, is a certain participated similitude [similitudo . . . participata] in man,” whereas the human nature of Christ is directly “conjoined to the divine nature itself in the person of the Son.”59 However, due to the distinction of natures, the soul of Christ is not essentially divine, so “it is necessary that it be made divine through participation, which is according to grace.”60 The texts on grace and participation which refer to Christ thus stress that Christ in his humanity must participate in the divine nature, even while acknowledging that the union of natures is through the divine person. Finally, while discussing in ST III, q. 62, a. 1, whether the sacraments are a cause of grace, distinguishing between principal and instrumental causes, and observing that the principal cause makes the effect like itself, 59 60 apply punishment, does not suffice for the perfection of the divine law, but it is necessary that man should be made totally fit for the participation of eternal happiness, which, indeed, is not capable of happening except through the grace of the Holy Spirit, through whom charity, which fulfills the law, is poured into our hearts for the grace of God is eternal life, as is said (Rom 6:23).” ST II-II, q. 19, a. 7: “Quia enim vita nostra ad divinam fruitionem ordinatur et dirigitur secundum quandam participationem divinae naturae, quae est per gratiam; sapientia secundum nos non solum consideratur ut est cognoscitiva Dei, sicut apud philosophos; sed etiam ut est directiva humanae vitae, quae non solum dirigitur secundum rationes humanas, sed etiam secundum rationes divinas”—“For since our life is ordered toward divine enjoyment and is directed according to a certain participation of the divine nature, which is through grace, wisdom in regard to us is not only considered as it is knowledgeable about God, just as with regard to the philosophers, but also as it is directive of human life, which is directed not only according to human reasons, but also according to divine reasons.” ST III, q. 2, a. 10, ad 1: “gratia quae est accidens, est quaedam similitudo divinitatis participata in homine. Per incarnationem autem humana natura non dicitur participasse similitudinem aliquam divinae naturae, sed dicitur esse coniuncta ipsi naturae divinae in persona filii”—“Through the Incarnation human nature is not said to have participated a certain likeness of the divine nature, but it is said to be conjoined to the divine nature itself in the person of the Son.” ST III, q. 7, a. 1, ad 1: “Sed quia cum unitate personae remanet distinctio naturarum, ut ex supra dictis patet, anima Christi non est per suam essentiam divina. Unde oportet quod fiat divina per participationem, quae est secundum gratiam”—“But since the distinction of the natures remains with the unity of the person, as is clear from what was said above, the soul of Christ is not by its essence divine. So it is necessary that . . .” Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 229 Thomas observes that no one can cause grace except God because “grace is nothing other than a certain participated similitude of the divine nature, according that verse of 2 Peter 1.”61 In the following article, on whether sacramental grace adds something above the grace of the virtues and the gifts, Thomas refers to the secunda pars, presumably to q. 110, a. 4, stating that grace in itself perfects the essence of the soul. He then offers what amounts to a précis of his teaching on grace as participation: thus, “grace, considered in itself, perfects the essence of the soul, inasmuch as it participates a certain similitude of the divine esse.”62 “And just as from the essence of the soul flow its powers, so from grace flow certain perfections for the powers of the soul, which are called virtues and gifts, by which the powers are perfected in relation [in ordine] to their acts.”63 He also, strikingly, refers to grace not as a participation in the divine nature, as he often does elsewhere, but as participating a likeness of the divine esse. Taken with other texts, Thomas thus cumulatively refers to grace as a participation in the divine existence (divinum esse in ST III, q. 62, a. 2 [see note 63]), the divine nature (divina natura in I-II, q. 110, a. 3 [note 25]), the divine good61 62 63 ST III, q. 62, a. 1: “Principalis quidem operatur per virtutem suae formae, cui assimilatur effectus, sicut ignis suo calore calefacit. Et hoc modo non potest causare gratiam nisi Deus, quia gratia nihil est aliud quam quaedam participata similitudo divinae naturae, secundum illud II Pet. I, ‘magna nobis et pretiosa promissa donavit, ut divinae simus consortes naturae’ —“The principal cause indeed works through the power of its form, to which the effect is likened, just as fire heats with its heat. And in this way no one is able to cause grace except God, because grace is nothing other than . . .” ST III, q. 62, a. 2: “Gratia, secundum se considerata, perficit essentiam animae, inquantum participat quandam similitudinem divini esse.” See also In II sent., d. 27, q. 1, a. 5, ad 3: “Ad tertium dicendum, quod tam augmentum gratiae quam etiam ipsius infusio est a Deo: sed tamen aliter se habent actus nostri ad infusionem gratiae et augmentum ipsius: quia ante infusionem gratiae homo nondum est particeps divini esse; unde actus sui sunt omnino improportionati ad merendum aliquod divinum, quod facultatem naturae excedat: sed per gratiam infusam constituitur in esse divino; unde iam actus sui proportionati efficiuntur ad promerendum augmentum vel perfectionem gratiae”—“To the third objection it must be said that as the infusion of grace itself is from God so is the increase of grace: but, nevertheless, our acts are related to the infusion of grace and the increase of it in different ways: for before the infusion of grace man is not yet a partaker of the divine being; so his acts are entirely disproportionate to merit something divine, which exceeds the faculty of nature: but through infused grace, he is established in divine being; so now his acts are made proportionate to merit the increase or perfection of grace.” ST III, q. 62, a. 2: “Et sicut ab essentia animae fluunt eius potentiae, ita a gratia fluunt quaedam perfectiones ad potentias animae, quae dicuntur virtutes et dona, quibus potentiae perficiuntur in ordine ad suos actus.” 230 Daniel Joseph Gordon ness (divina bonitas in I-II, q. 110, a. 2 [note 85]), the divine knowledge (cognitio divina in ST I-II, q. 110, a. 4 [note 26]), and the divine love (amor divinum in ST I-II, q. 110, a. 4 [note 26]). Three conclusions follow from these investigations. First, to speak of grace as a participation of the divine nature is to indicate that man does not possess God essentially but accidentally. Grace is something that qualifies man’s nature and actions, but does not replace them. Grace perfects and builds on nature; it does not destroy it.64 Supposing the impossible, if man possessed the divine nature not in a participated way, but in its fullness, man would cease to be man and would be identical with the essence of God—an impossible conclusion. In this sense, the participated possession of grace is contrasted with possessing something essentially.65 Second, if grace is an accidental participation in the divine nature, it must somehow be communicated to the creature. It is not something “inborn” (natus) or naturally possessed. Thus, grace must be communicated to man. Although God could bestow grace directly, according to Saint Thomas, grace comes to us through the humanity of Christ.66 In addition, the ordinary means of the reception of grace is through the sacraments, as a separated instrumental cause. Third, the notion of causation, instrumental or otherwise, implies an effect. Saint Thomas notes three modes of participation in his commentary on Boethius’s De hebdomadibus.67 In the first mode of participation, which has a more logical tone to it, a species participates in the genus (the species man partakes of the genus animal) or an individual participates in the species (the individual Socrates partakes of the species man). In the second mode of participation, a substance participates its accidents 64 65 66 67 See ST I, q. 1, a. 8, ad 2, for the earliest reference to this principle in the Summa. Thomas makes the essentialiter–participative distinction in ST I-II, q. 62, a. 1, ad 1. See, for example, ST III, q. 8, a. 1, ad 1 (as well as the rest of the question). For this threefold division, see the commentary of Saint Thomas on the De hebdomadibus, no. 24 (commentary on rule 2): “Now participating is almost a taking part. Hence: (a) Whenever something particularly receives what pertains universally to something else, it is said to participate in it. For instance, man is said to participate in animal, since it does not have the account of animal in its full generality. Socrates participates in man for the same reason. (b) The subject likewise participates in its accident, and so does matter in form, since the substantial or accidental form, which is common in virtue of its account, is determined to this or that subject. (c) The effect is similarly said to participate in its cause, especially when it isn’t equal to the power of its cause—e. g. when we say that air ‘participates’ in sunlight because it doesn’t receive it with the brightness there is in the sun” (Aquinas: Exposition of Boethius’s Hebdomads, trans. Peter King, 2004, scribd.com/document/444959507/AQUINAS-Exposition-of-Hebdomads). Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 231 (an apple partakes of redness) and matter participates its form (some clay partakes the form of a sphere). In the third mode of participation, the effect participates in the cause, as air partakes of the light of the sun. In all these cases, to participate something is to possess it in a limited way, to have some “part” in it. It would seem that Saint Thomas speaks of grace as a “participation” of God in the third sense: one does not participate God as a species does a genus, or a substance an accident, or matter its form, but such that the effect brought about in the creature makes it somehow like God, although in a limited and non-identical way, that is, as being able to know and love the cause in some way. In this sense, insofar as God grants grace to men, he gives them something, a likeness, of himself. In the following sections, we will explore more precisely how grace makes man “like” God, and how this adds color to the picture of how Thomas interprets 2 Peter 1:4 in relational terms. Grace as Assimilatio and Conformatio: The Divine Missions In the questions on grace (ST I-II, qq. 109–14), Saint Thomas also glosses 2 Peter 1:4 in terms of assimilatio.68 This term links the discussion to the divine missions in ST I, q. 43, where the same word appears in a similar context.69 The divine missions can thus illuminate how Saint Thomas understands 2 Peter 1:4. His discussion, especially in the final article on the essence of grace, also has a conceptual resonance with his discussion of grace in the divine missions. Recall how Thomas states the following in ST I–II, q. 110, a. 4: For just as by the intellective power man participates the divine knowledge [participat cognitionem divinam] through the virtue of faith, and by the power of the will [he participates] the divine love [amorem divinum] through the virtue of charity, so also through the nature of the soul he participates, according to a certain similitude, 68 69 See ST III, q. 3, a. 4, ad 3: “The assumption which is made through the grace of adoption is terminated in a certain participation [participatio] of the divine nature according to an assimilation [assimilatio] of its divine goodness, according to 2 Peter 1, as consorts of the divine nature.” The divine missions has become a popular topic in recent literature. For an important study, see Gilles Emery, “Theologia and Dispensatio: The Centrality of the Divine Missions in St. Thomas’s Trinitarian Theology,” The Thomist 74, no. 4 (2010): 515–61. See also the first two chapters in Dominic Legge, The Trinitarian Christology of St Thomas Aquinas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017). Another helpful overview is available in chapter 15, “Missions,” from Gilles Emery, The Trinitarian Theology of Saint Thomas Aquinas, trans. Francesca Aran Murphy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). 232 Daniel Joseph Gordon the divine nature [participat…naturam divinam], through a certain regeneration or recreation.70 Thus, man participates in the divine nature through habitual grace, the divine knowledge through faith, and the divine goodness through charity. The references to a participation in faith and charity, conceptually and terminologically, echo the discussion of the assimilation (assimilatio) of the human person to the Son and the Holy Spirit in the question on the divine missions: The soul is conformed [confirmatur] to God through grace. So for this, that some divine person is sent to someone through grace, it is necessary that there be made some assimilation [assimilatio] of him to the divine person who is sent through some gift of grace. And because the Holy Spirit is the gift of love, the soul is assimilated [assimilatur] to the Holy Spirit through the gift of charity [per donum caritatis], so the mission of the Holy Spirit is directed according to the gift of charity. And the Son is the Word, not any word, but the one breathing forth love [spirans amorem]. . . . Therefore, the Son is not sent according to any perfection of the intellect, but according to a certain instruction of the intellect [instructionem intellectus] by which it breaks forth into an affection of love.71 The parallels between the two texts are fairly obvious. The text on the essence of grace speaks of a participation in the divine nature, in the divine knowledge, and in the divine love. The text on the divine missions argues that the soul is conformed to God through grace. More specifically, there is an assimilation (assimilatio) of the soul to the Holy Spirit through the gift of charity and to the Son through an “instruction of the intellect” breaking forth into an affection of love.72 70 71 72 See note 26 above for full Latin. ST I, q. 43, a. 5, ad 2: “Anima per gratiam conformatur Deo. Unde ad hoc quod aliqua persona divina mittatur ad aliquem per gratiam, oportet quod fiat assimilatio illius ad divinam personam quae mittitur per aliquod gratiae donum. Et quia spiritus sanctus est amor, per donum caritatis anima spiritui sancto assimilatur, unde secundum donum caritatis attenditur missio spiritus sancti. Filius autem est verbum, non qualecumque, sed spirans amorem. . . . Non igitur secundum quamlibet perfectionem intellectus mittitur filius, sed secundum talem instructionem intellectus, qua prorumpat in affectum amoris.” A fuller discussion of the human person’s assimilation to the divine persons requires its own study, especially in light of nineteenth- and twentieth-century theological controversies on grace and beatitude. For the moment, however, Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 233 The same question also details how the Son and Holy Spirit are sent to the soul in sanctifying grace and insofar as the soul actually knows and loves the divine persons. Thus, Thomas writes that “it belongs to a divine person to be sent according as he exists in a new way in something; and to be given according as he is had by someone. But neither of these exists except according to the grace that makes pleasing [gratia gratum faciens].” 73 Thus, habitual grace, as the root of the life of grace, is the only way by which a divine person can be possessed by a creature in a new way, apart from God’s common mode of being (through the divine essence, power, and presence).74 In the same article, Thomas also remarks on human action: Above this common mode, there is a special one, which belongs to the rational creature in which God is said to exist, just as the one known is in the one knowing [cognitum in cognoscente] and the one loved is in the one loving [amatum in amante]. And because, by knowing and by loving, the rational creature by its operation attains to God himself, according to this special mode, God is not only said 73 74 one can note that assimilatio involves the notion of likeness (similitudo). For an analysis of the degrees of likenesses (similia), see ST I, q. 4, a. 3. Briefly, things are alike (1) according to the same form ( forma), aspect (ratio), and mode (modus); (2) according to the same form and aspect but not according to the same mode; or (3) according to the same form but not according to the same aspect and mode. Further, regarding similarity according to likeness of form, this can be either according to the species, genus, or analogy (analogia). To speak of a likeness (similitudo) between man and God or to speak of becoming like God (assimilatio) would seem to fall into this final category: there is an analogical likeness between Creator and creature, not agreeing in genus or species, but still somehow observing some likeness, since, as Thomas states in the body of the article, every agent makes something like itself (“Cum enim omne agens agat sibi simile inquantum est agens, agit autem unumquodque secundum suam formam, necesse est quod in effectu sit similitudo formae agentis”—“For since every agent makes something like itself inasmuch as it is acting, and each thing acts according to its form, it is necessary that the likeness of the form of the agent should be in the effect”). The way in which the human person becomes like God is through his actually knowing and loving the divine persons in their distinction. ST I, q. 43, a. 3: “Divinae personae convenit mitti, secundum quod novo modo existit in aliquo; dari autem, secundum quod habetur ab aliquo. Neutrum autem horum est nisi secundum gratiam gratum facientem.” See ST I, q. 43, a. 3: “Est enim unus communis modus quo Deus est in omnibus rebus per essentiam, potentiam et praesentiam, sicut causa in effectibus participantibus bonitatem ipsius”—“For there is one common way by which God is in all things by his essence, power, and presence, just as the cause is in the effects participating its goodness.” 234 Daniel Joseph Gordon to be in [esse in] the rational creature, but also to dwell in it [habitare in ea] just as in his temple.75 The implication of this passage is that the divine persons are present to the rational creature insofar as it knows and loves the divine persons in their distinction, through grace.76 Again, this passage mirrors the participation of the creature through habitual grace as stated in ST I-II, q. 110, a. 4: man becomes like God through his ability to know him and to love him.77 Thus, Saint. Thomas explains 2 Peter 1:4 in terms of participation in the divine nature, the divine knowledge, and the divine love. These references parallel, terminologically and conceptually, the question on the divine missions.78 Participation in the divine nature, through habitual grace, thus makes possible a personal relationship not only with God, as denoting what is common to the divine persons, but with the divine persons 75 76 77 78 ST I, q. 43, a. 3: “Super istum modum autem communem, est unus specialis, qui convenit creaturae rationali, in qua Deus dicitur esse sicut cognitum in cognoscente et amatum in amante. Et quia, cognoscendo et amando, creatura rationalis sua operatione attingit ad ipsum Deum, secundum istum specialem modum Deus non solum dicitur esse in creatura rationali, sed etiam habitare in ea sicut in templo suo.” See ST I, q. 43, a. 3: “Similiter illud solum habere dicimur, quo libere possumus uti vel frui. Habere autem potestatem fruendi divina persona, est solum secundum gratiam gratum facientem” (“We are said to have something which we are freely able to use or enjoy. But to have the power of enjoying a divine person is only according to the grace that makes one pleasing”). On the union of the human person with the divine persons, see “How Can a Creature Be Related to a Single Divine Person?” and the surrounding discussion in Legge, Trinitarian Christology, 19–21: “Aquinas has in mind a created effect that has a real relation to a single divine person because it ‘terminates’ to what is proper to that person. This ‘termination’ is something real in the creature; it is not only a manner of speaking” (21). In the question on the divine missions, graced knowledge and love are presented as an assimilation to the person of the Son, who proceeds by way of intellect, and to the Holy Spirit, who proceeds by way of love. In the question on the essence of grace, the virtue of charity is presented as participation in the divine love and faith in the divine knowledge. One might well wonder how these two explanations are compatible with one another, since charity would seem to be both an assimilation to the Holy Spirit in himself and a participation in the divine knowledge (which is not proper to the Holy Spirit but common to the three divine persons), while faith would seem to be both an assimilation to the Son in himself and participation in the divine love (which, again, is not proper to the Son but common to the three divine persons). Both passages include references to God, grace, knowledge, love, and participation or assimilation. Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 235 themselves.79 And so, participation through grace, making possible an assimilation and conformation to the divine persons, culminates in the expression of the Trinity in the world, made present through the graced human actions of knowing and loving the divine persons by which man imitates the divine life. Grace as Repraesentatio and Imitatio: The Image of God One can profitably extend these reflections—the connection between (1) grace as participation and (2) assimilatio/conformatio, and that connection in relation to (3) the divine missions—to the discussion of repraesentatio/ imitatio on the image of God in man in ST I, q. 93, a. 5.80 Rather than using the language of consors and participatio (as in ST I-II, q. 110, aa. 3–4) or assimilatio and conformatio (ST I, q. 43, a. 5), Thomas prefers to speak about grace here in terms of repraesentatio and imitatio. Saint Thomas does not explicitly reference 2 Peter 1:4 in his discussion of the image of God in question 93. However, several conceptual and terminological similarities connect the verse with the question on the image of God. First, and perhaps most obviously, Saint Thomas explains 2 Peter 1:4 in terms of similitudo.81 The notion of likeness, especially in the 79 80 81 ST I, q. 93, a. 5: “Unde manifestum est quod distinctio divinarum personarum est secundum quod divinae naturae convenit. Unde esse ad imaginem Dei secundum imitationem divinae naturae, non excludit hoc quod est esse ad imaginem Dei secundum repraesentationem trium personarum; sed magis unum ad alterum sequitur. Sic igitur dicendum est in homine esse imaginem Dei et quantum ad naturam divinam, et quantum ad Trinitatem personarum, nam et in ipso Deo in tribus personis una existit natura”—“Thus, it is clear that the distinction of the divine persons is according as it belongs to the divine nature. So, to be toward the image of God according to the imitation of the divine nature does not exclude that it is also to be toward the image of God according to a representation of the three persons; but, rather, one follows from the other. In this way, therefore, it must be said that the image of God is in man both with respect to the divine nature and with respect to the trinity of persons, for even in God himself one nature exists in three persons.” For recent studies on this topic in Aquinas, see: D. Juvenal Merriell, To the Image of the Trinity: A Study in the Development Aquinas’ Teaching (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1990); Bernhard Blankenhorn, The Mystery of Union with God: Dionysian Mysticism in Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2015), 215–48; Servais Pinckaers, “Ethics and the Image of God,” in The Pinckaers Reader: Renewing Thomistic Moral Theology, ed. John Berkman and Craig Titus (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2005), 130–43; Gilles Emery, Trinitarian Theology, 395–402. See, for example, ST I, q. 13, a. 9: “The divine nature is not communicable except 236 Daniel Joseph Gordon context of becoming like God, brings to mind the question on the image of God in the Summa. Second, there is an obvious conceptual path in the prima pars from the discussion of assimilation to the divine persons in question 43 to the treatment of the image of God in question 93. In the discussion of the divine missions, Thomas notes how the rational creature is assimilated to the divine persons through the “gift of charity” and the “instruction of the intellect” (q. 43, a. 5, ad 2). In the question on the image of God, Thomas also discusses how man is not only an image of the divine nature but also of the three divine persons: “To be ‘toward’ the image of God according to the imitation of the divine nature does not exclude this, that it is also be ‘toward’ the image of God according to a representation of the three persons.”82 So, one can follow a path from ST I-II, q. 110, a. 4 (on participation in the divine nature, knowledge, and love), to I, q. 43, a. 5, ad 2 (on the assimilation to the Holy Spirit and the Son through love and instruction), to I, q. 93, a. 5 (on “whether the image of God is in man by comparison to the divine essence, or to the divine persons, or to one of them”).83 In short, by explaining 2 Peter 1:4 in terms of participation, and by describing participation in terms of the divine knowledge and love, Saint Thomas prompts the reader to recall the divine missions and, consequently, the image of God in man, as it pertains to 2 Peter 1:4. Third, in the context of discussing the participation of the soul in the divine nature in ST I-II, q. 110, a. 2, the Common Doctor uses expressio as a synonym for participatio.84 Thus, he writes, “[grace] is nobler than the nature of the soul, inasmuch as it is the expression or participation [expressio vel participatio] of the divine goodness.”85 The same term expres- 82 83 84 85 according to the participation of a likeness [secundum similitudinis participationem]. . . . This name God is in no way communicable according to its whole signification, but according to . . . a certain likeness.” See also ST I-II, q. 110, a. 4 (note 26 above). ST I, q. 93, a. 5: “Unde esse ad imaginem Dei secundum imitationem divinae naturae, non excludit hoc quod est esse ad imaginem Dei secundum repraesentationem trium personarum” ST I, q. 93, proem.: “Quinto, utrum in homine sit imago Dei per comparationem ad essentiam, vel ad personas divinas omnes, aut unam earum.” ST I-II, q. 110, a. 3, cites 2 Pet 1:4, which, of course, immediately follows q. 110, a. 2. ST I-II, q. 110, a. 2, ad 2: “Id enim quod substantialiter est in Deo, accidentaliter fit in anima participante divinam bonitatem, ut de scientia patet. Secundum hoc ergo, quia anima imperfecte participat divinam bonitatem, ipsa participatio divinae bonitatis quae est gratia, imperfectiori modo habet esse in anima quam anima in seipsa subsistat. Est tamen nobilior quam natura animae, inquantum est expressio vel participatio divinae bonitatis, non autem quantum ad modum Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 237 sio, not surprisingly, reappears in the discussion on the image of God: “It is clear that likeness regards the meaning of image [ratione imaginis], and that image adds something above the notion of likeness, namely, that it is expressed from some other [ex alio expressum], for image is said from this, that it is made for the imitation of another.”86 Finally, Thomas draws a connection between image and representation: “Some representation of species [repraesentatio speciei] belongs to the meaning of image.”87 Thus, Saint Thomas joins participatio with expressio (I-II, q. 110, a. 2, ad 2), and expressio with imitatio and imago (I, q. 93, a. 1), and imago with repraesentatio (I, q. 93, a. 7). Thomas thus explains the consors of 2 Peter 1:4 in terms of participatio, expressio, and similitudo, and he elsewhere discusses these three latter words with reference to imago, repraesentatio, and imitatio. In sum, to understand the fullness of the meaning of participatio, expressio, and similitudo—at least insofar as Saint Thomas applies it to the exegesis of 2 Peter 1:4—one must also grasp the interrelated meanings of imago, repraesentatio, and imitatio. The terminological similarities between 2 Peter 1:4 and Thomas’s question on the essence of grace also manifest a deep conceptual kinship between the notion of what it means to be a “partaker” of the divine nature and what it means to image, represent, express, and imitate the divine nature. A discussion of the image of God runs beyond the scope of this study, but it is sufficient for our purposes to see that Saint Thomas explains 2 Peter 1:4 in terms that link it terminologically and conceptually to the discussion of the image of God in ST I, q. 93. Still, we can at least note how the discussion of the image of God 86 87 essendi”—“For that which is in God in a substantial way comes to be in an accidental way in the soul participating in the divine goodness, as is clear regarding knowledge. According to this, therefore, because the soul imperfectly participates the divine goodness, the participation itself of the divine goodness, which is grace, has a more imperfect existence in the soul than the soul subsists in itself. [Grace] is nobler than the nature of the soul, inasmuch as it is the expression or participation of the divine goodness, but not with respect to the mode of being.” ST I, q. 93, a. 1: “Sicut Augustinus dicit in libro octoginta trium quaest. ubi est imago, continuo est et similitudo; sed ubi est similitudo, non continuo est imago. Ex quo patet quod similitudo est de ratione imaginis, et quod imago aliquid addit supra rationem similitudinis, scilicet quod sit ex alio expressum, imago enim dicitur ex eo quod agitur ad imitationem alterius”—“As Augustine says in the Book of 83 Questions, where there is an image, there is immediately likeness; but where there is likeness, image does not exist immediately. From which it is clear that likeness regards . . .” ST I, q. 93, a. 7 (and parallel passages): “ad rationem imaginis pertinet aliqualis repraesentatio speciei.” 238 Daniel Joseph Gordon highlights the active role of the human person in becoming like God and therefore imitating him. One sees this most obviously in a concluding sentence in article 7: “And therefore the image of the Trinity is observed primarily and principally in the mind in act—as namely, from the knowledge which we have, we form an inner word by thinking, and from this we break forth into love.”88 If there is a connection between 2 Peter 1:4 and the imago Dei, to be a consors or “partaker” of the divine nature is to express, imitate, and represent God, precisely insofar as the graced creature actively knows and loves God, both in what is common to the persons and in their very distinction.89 Conclusion Saint Thomas therefore weaves 2 Peter 1:4 into almost every aspect of his theology of grace. We are made “partakers” of the divine nature through the grace of the Trinity and the salvific and priestly action of Jesus Christ. Through this “partaking” the human person becomes able to actually know and love God, indeed, even the divine persons, and to become like them. From a systematic perspective, Thomas explains this verse by placing it within a dense constellation of terms that include the richly analogical notions of participatio, assimilatio, and similitudo. These terms open wider vistas onto the divine missions, extending the analysis to conformatio vis-àvis the Trinity, as well as to imitatio and repraesentatio in relation to the image of God. Besides forging these lexical linkages, which provide opportunity for further study, Saint Thomas also explains the verse from differ88 89 ST I, q. 93, a. 7: “Et ideo primo et principaliter attenditur imago Trinitatis in mente secundum actus, prout scilicet ex notitia quam habemus, cogitando interius verbum formamus, et ex hoc in amorem prorumpimus.” The term “prorumpo” (a perhaps uncommon term) appears again in ST I, q. 43, a. 5 (see note 71 above). In both cases, the discussion is about how the acts of the human person in knowing and loving God mirror the processions of the Word and the Holy Spirit. Even if the word “imago” does not appear in the question on the divine missions, the lexical and conceptual similarities between the two questions is striking. See, again, ST I, q. 93, a. 5 (note 79 above). On imitatio in relation to the image of God, see the whole of ST I, q. 93, especially a. 4: “Respondeo dicendum quod, cum homo secundum intellectualem naturam ad imaginem Dei esse dicatur, secundum hoc est maxime ad imaginem Dei, secundum quod intellectualis natura Deum maxime imitari potest. Imitatur autem intellectualis natura maxime Deum quantum ad hoc, quod Deus seipsum intelligit et amat”—“Since man is said to be toward the image of God according to his intellectual nature, he is above all toward the image of God according as the intellectual nature is most of all able to imitate God. And the intellectual nature most of all imitates God inasmuch as God knows and loves himself.” Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Participation in the Divine Nature 239 ent methodological perspectives: philosophically, he explains it in terms of participation; theologically, he contextualizes the verse in terms of the inner Trinitarian life and the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. He also draws on philosophical notions of nature, power, virtue, and action to clarify these theological mysteries. Across his writings, Saint Thomas thus places 2 Peter 1:4 in a network of ideas and methods that explicate its meaning. From a historical perspective, the Angelic Doctor quotes the verse across his career, in his earliest writings, including the Scriptum, and in middle works such as the Summa contra gentiles. His use of the text comes to full flower in the Summa theologiae, where he interprets the “partaking” of 2 Peter 1:4 in terms of habitual grace and the theological virtues of faith and charity, and even points to its source in the mediating priesthood of Jesus Christ and his sacraments. The scriptural commentaries, in a way, pick up where the Summa leaves off, highlighting the interpersonal dimension of the verse, suggesting how our “partaking” of God is accomplished through the mediation of Christ and comes to fruition in our relation with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Finally, Saint Thomas explains our “partaking” of God in terms of participation, which opens a path to understanding the passage in light of the divine missions and image of God. Thus, in the question on the divine missions (ST I, q. 43), Thomas uses the language of conformatio and assimilatio to explain this participation. Then, in the question on the image of God in man (ST I, q. 93), even as an image of the Trinity, Thomas adopts the language of imitatio and repraesentatio to explain our graced participation in God. This knowing and loving of God constitutes the personal relationship between man and God made possible in the life of grace. Many modern exegeses of 2 Peter 1:4, reading the text either as a detrimental Hellenization of Christianity or exclusively in covenantal terms, thus present a false dichotomy. In contrast, Saint Thomas unpacks the text to show how the word consors, explained in terms of participatio, assimilatio/conformatio, and repraesentatio/imitatio does not belittle or obscure our personal relationship with God but guarantees and grounds its possibility, bringing it to full expression in terms of our assimilation to and imitative N&V representation of the Trinity itself.90 90 I would like to thank Joseph Wawrykow and Vincent Strand, S.J., for providing valuable comments on earlier drafts of this work. The faults that remain are, of course, my own. I am also grateful for the unfailing encouragement of Thomas Joseph White, O.P., and Matthew Levering, without whom this project would not have reached completion. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 241–272 241 God and the Permission of Evil Steven A. Long Ave Maria University Ave Maria, FL Introduction In prior writings I have addressed the work of Jacques Maritain with respect to divine providential government and human liberty,1 and subsequently criticized the teaching of Francisco Marín-Sola and his gifted translator and defender Professor Michael Torre.2 In this essay I wish to attempt two things, the second of even greater significance than is the first. As for the first, recently Professor Torre has responded in the pages of Revue thomiste3 to my criticisms of Marín-Sola. He forwards a central criticism of the understanding of Saint Thomas’s teaching common to the Dominicans from the Congregatio de Auxiliis, and rightly associated with Domingo Bañez. This central criticism is the charge that permission of sin as a non-upholding in good makes God to be an accidental cause of moral evil, making God too complicit with evil to be an acceptable position for a Roman Catholic thinker to hold. Torre also considers that Thomas did not hold the position that sin follows upon an antecedent permissive decree that is a non-upholding in good. I do not consider these claims adequate to the teaching of Aquinas and of Bañez, and wish briefly to state why. 1 2 3 Steven A. Long, “Providence, Liberte et Loi Naturelle,” Revue thomiste 102 (2002): 355–406. See Steven A. Long, “Petite réflexion sur Marin-Sola et Torre à propos de la grâce et la liberté,” Revue thomiste 115 (2015): 469–80, and Michael Torre, Do Not Resist the Spirit’s Call: Francisco Marín-Sola on Sufficient Grace (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2013). Michael Torre, “Àpropos de Marin-Sola sur la grâce suffisante,” Revue thomiste 118 (2018): 293–312. 242 Steven A. Long Second and more centrally, in addition to offering brief response to this argument, it seems to this author of crucial importance that essential elements from the prior discussion of these matters be given sufficient attention. And so I also argue that the criticisms made by Michel Labourdette and Jean-Hervé Nicolas of Maritain’s analysis were never sufficiently understood and answered by the proponents of “breakable” divine motion. Even more importantly, I wish to point out what seems to me to be a critical misreading of the text of Aquinas which influenced Nicolas toward the disavowal of his earlier analysis, an earlier analysis for which afterward (with good reason!) he could find no adequate substitute. These considerations from prior doctrinal expositions are of great objective importance, not least because some of these have not to the present day adequately been understood by those to whom they were directed, but also because in the case of Nicolas he abandoned his own prior brilliant analysis—which itself has never sufficiently been answered—on the force of what appears to be a (widely shared) misinterpretation of a text of Aquinas. Thus, this work is aimed not simply at response to Professor Torre's defense of Marín-Sola, but even more principally seeks to pursue two major considerations: (1) the pivotal analysis to be found in prior speculative engagement of this subject, especially in the work of Labourdette and Nicolas, and (2) what I will argue was a deficient analysis of a text of Aquinas that moved Nicolas to abandon what he himself nonetheless realized was the only hope of a truly systematic response to the question of divine causality and evil. Is Bañez Correct That Divine Non-Upholding in Good Does Not Make God an Accidental Cause of Moral Evil? Regarding the divine permission of sin according to Bañez, Professor Torre argues as follows: I have already mentioned one of these difficulties. The position of Bañez seems to imply the following reasoning: Major: The non-conservation in being is the per accidens cause of a negation or deficiency. Minor: The permission of sin by God is a non-conservation in being. Conclusion: The permission of sin by God is the per accidens cause of a negation or deficiency. From which it follows that: God and the Permission of Evil 243 Major: Sin is an act endowed with a moral deficiency (it is a defective act). Minor: God is the primary cause of both (a) the act of sin and (b) its deficiency. Conclusion: God is the root cause of sin as sin.4 However, the analysis of Thomas’s text provided by Bañez is not considered in his treatment. I quote from his commentary on Summa theologiae [ST] I, q. 19, art. 9, ad 3: Along with this, however, is the status in truth, that sins are done, but not that God wills them to be done, nor that he wills them not to be done because this will would impede every sin. In brief, it is to be noted here, about the permission of sin, first, that [this permission] is good and willed by God, who orders it to a greater good that is the good that takes away sin. Second, it should be noted, that God permits sin, not that he is said to cause sin, directly, nor indirectly, nor by accident. Indeed, directly, it is manifest: because sin insofar as sin, does not have the nature [rationem] of the good, and thus is not [as such] able to be willed. Indirectly, however, He is not the cause of sin: because however He may impede and not impede, He is not bound because He is not required indirectly to achieve or will some special effect as some cause is said to be. Nor finally is He an accidental cause, because the act of the divine will permitting sin does not reach to the very sin as to an effect efficaciously flowing 4 Torre, “Àpropos de Marin-Sola,” 308: “J’ai déjà évoqué l’une de ces difficultés. La position de Bânez semble impliquer le raisonnement suivant: Majeure: la non-conservation dans l’être est la cause per accidens d’une négation ou déficience. Mineure: la permission de Dieu du péché est une non-conservation de l’être. Conclusion: la permission du péché par Dieu est la cause per accidens d’une négation ou déficience. D’où il résulte que: Majeure: le péché est un acte doté d ’une déficience morale (c’est un acte défectueux). Mineure: Dieu est la cause première à la fois de (a) l’acte de péché et (b) de sa déficience. Conclusion: Dieu est la cause première du péché en tant que péché.” Unless otherwise noted, all translations are my own, although occassionally consulting published translations if available. 244 Steven A. Long from it. That which is required for this, is that some cause is said accidentally to bring about some effect: as for example, if Peter is digging a grave, and discovers a treasure, this is said to be an accidental cause of the discovery of the treasure; because the very act of digging really achieves the discovery of the treasure, although this is not the intent. But still, if the treasure is discovered, and a thief comes and takes it, it will not be said that Peter is by accident the cause of the robbery.”5 It seems to this author that the argument of Bañez is unshakeable on this point, for two reasons. To take a moment to observe this argument, one observes his words that: “Second, it should be noted, that God permits sin, not that he is said to cause sin, directly, nor indirectly, nor by accident” (“Secundo advertendum est, quod, licet Deus permittat peccatum, non tamen potest dici causi peccati, directe, neque indirecte, neque per accidens.”). Clearly he does not think it possible, nor does he intend to argue for any accidental causality of sin by God. But what is his argument? Bañez reasons that God cannot be an accidental cause of sin precisely because “the act of the divine will permitting sin does not reach to the very sin as to an effect efficaciously flowing from it” (“quia actio divinae voluntatis permittendi peccatum non attingit ad ipsum peccatum tanquam ad effectum efficaciter procedentem ab illa”). The account given by Bañez of the nature of accidental causality—the reason that God is not an accidental 5 “Cum hoc tamen stat in veritate, quod fiant peccata, non tamen quod Deus velit fieri, neque quod velit non fieri: quoniam haec voluntas omnino impediret omnia peccsata. Denique, advertendum est hic, circa permissionem peccati, primo, quod illa est bona et volita a Deo, ordinante illam ad majus bonum, quam sit bonum quo privat peccatum. Secundo advertendum est, quod, licet Deus permittat peccatum, non tamen potest dici causi peccati, directe, neque indirecte, neque per accidens. Directe quidem, manifestum est: quia peccatum inquantum peccatum, non habet rationem boni, et ita non potest appeti. Indirecte vero, non est causa peccati: quia quamvis possit impedire et non impediat, non tenetur, quod requiritur ut aliqua causa dicatur indirecte efficere aliquem effectum, aut velle. Neque tandem est causa per accidens: quia actio divinae voluntatis permittendi peccatum non attingit ad ipsum peccatum tanquam ad effectum efficaciter procedentem ab illa. Quod quidem requiritur adhoc, quod aliqua causa dicitur per accidens efficere aliquem effectum: ut v. g. si petrus fodiens sepulchrum, forte invenit thesaurum, dicitur causa per accidens inventionis thesauri; quia actio ipsius fodientis terram attigit revera ad inventionem thesauri quamvis hoc non fuerit intentum. Sed tamen, si invento thesauro, affuit latro, et rapuit illum, tunc non dicetur Petrus causa per accidens rapinae” (Bañez, Scholastica Commentaria in Primam Partem Summae Theologicae S. Thomas Aquinatis, ed. Luis Urbano [Madrid-Valencia: Ed. F.E.D.A, 1934], 437). God and the Permission of Evil 245 cause of sin—is quite clear in his text: “What is required for this, is that some cause is said accidentally to bring about some effect: as for example, if Peter is digging a grave, and discovers a treasure, this is said to be an accidental cause of the discovery of the treasure; because the very act of digging really achieves the discovery of the treasure, although this is not the intent. But still, if the treasure is discovered, and a thief comes and takes it, it will not be said that Peter is by accident the cause of the robbery.” Peter discovering the treasure is a condition of its being robbed, but it is not the cause of its being robbed. Of course, if the treasure is not discovered, it cannot be robbed, and Peter makes this discovery to occur. Also it is true that Peter does not stop the robbery, but this need not imply that Peter either essentially or accidentally aids the robbery in any way. Likewise, if Peter did not discover the treasure, Peter would not owing to this become the accidental cause of it being hidden: because Peter did not hide it or do anything causing it to be hidden. God’s causality extends to all being, true, and good, and nothing God causes in itself necessitates evil. But if nothing God causes extends to the effect qua evil, we cannot say that the divine permission is the same as divine accidental causation of evil. This argument of Bañez reposes principally on the convertibility of being with good. The divine causality in being and good in no way causes moral evil, even though this causality is a condition that is required for evil insofar as God is the author of every actual entity and good. We may call this the “anti-Manichaean” aspect of the argument of Bañez. God cannot even accidentally cause moral evil as such, because his causality never brings about evil, but only being, good, and true. Just as the gravedigger discovering the treasure does not make him an accidental cause of its robbery, so God causing the being, true, and good of defectible things does not make actual defect a divine effect, as that defection is a deprivation. That one not uphold from defect does not make one either the per se or the per accidens cause of such a defect, just as Peter not stopping the robber’s theft does not make him an accidental cause of theft. Yet it might be argued that one who can uphold ought to uphold, and this seems to be the gravamen of Torre’s argument. Likewise was it Maritain’s, expressed in the image of the parents guiding the hand of a child writing: if the parents withdraw their support, the handwriting fails, and for this, Maritain says, the parent is responsible. Thus he writes: And to allow a thing to be done by withdrawing one’s hand, is this not to cause it indirectly? A child can write straightly only if I hold the pen with it; if I withdraw my hand, the child’s hand makes only 246 Steven A. Long a scribble. It is clearly the cause of the scribble, and the sole direct cause. But have I not been the indirect cause by withdrawing my hand? For my part, I answer “yes.” This seems obvious to me. But at bottom this does not matter to me essentially. Even if it would be true that thanks to the resources of logic and of skillfully elaborated definitions and distinctions one succeeded in completely eliminating the concept and the word “cause,” even indirect (I mean of cause considered under the relation of efficiency), a second question remains, and this is of capital importance. Supposed, but not conceded, that God is not, in withdrawing His hand, the indirect cause of the culpable failure of the creature, it in any case remains that He Himself has first willed, with a will not causative but permissive, that this failure occur in the world. For it is on Him alone and on His sole first initiative, the neo-Bañezians clearly point out, that depended the first moment, the moment of the permissive decree itself, which has a priority of nature over the failure of the creature.6 One must observe, firstly, that Maritain’s reasoning—not on specious but on solid grounds—is inadmissible, because the withdrawing of the parent’s hand is not in the least a cause of the child writing. Let us presume that when the parental hand is withdrawn the child ceases writing: but then there is no “scribble.” Without the disposition to continue to write when the conditions of good writing do not exist—of course “defective” solely in relation to good writing, to be sure, and perhaps there is a reason to let the child scribble!—no scribble occurs. It will be observed that this “defective disposition” (solely in relation to good writing) is not something that exists solely because a parent “permits” it. After all, the parent is not God. But the permission of such defect is not the causing of defect, even though if one knows the first, one knows the second. Likewise, we know that if Peter after accidentally discovering treasure does not stop thieves from taking it (assuming no other preventing agency is proximate), it will be stolen: but this does not make Peter even accidentally to have caused its theft. It may be said that God not upholding the creature in good renders the defection of the creature “necessary.” But this necessity is hypothetical, that is, it denies nothing of the power of the creature, but only denies 6 Jacques Maritain, God and the Permission of Evil, trans. Joseph Owens (Milwaukee, WI: Bruce, 1966), 29. God and the Permission of Evil 247 a special upholding from something to which the creature is naturally susceptible albeit not naturally and necessarily subject. Further, contingency and necessity are according to Saint Thomas Aquinas not discriminated in relation to God but in relation to the proximate cause:7 and the proximate cause which is the human will is in all else but the willing of the end of happiness a contingent cause.8 On all these grounds, Maritain’s argument is insufficient. Yet there is a point to Maritain’s observation that goes to the very character of the given created order and its goodness as such. Granted that God by not upholding the creature in good does not even accidentally cause evil, clearly God by creating defectible creatures, and by permitting defect, is a condition for evil. Further, if divine permission of evil as a “non-upholding in good” is thought to be responsible for the sins of creatures supposed to have been unjustly and arbitrarily subject to voluntary defect because of the antecedent divine permission of evil, clearly God’s direct role in sustaining in being the morally evil creatures that do evil is even greater. Why was Hitler not annihilated, or Stalin—or, not annihilated, but simply moved to hell—the very instant the defect of malice was divinely permitted to take root in Hitler or Stalin? What is more, on Maritain’s own view—and that of Marín-Sola, Father William Most, and many others—God retains the power simply to move the creature freely to assent. Is withholding that motion not likewise subject to Maritain’s critique? We may sum all this up with two questions: (1) Is God wrong, and unjust, in not upholding creatures that are by their natures not defective but defectible, from all possible 7 8 De malo, q. 16, a. 7, ad 15: “Et ideo necessitas et contingentia in rebus distinguuntur non per habitudinem ad voluntatem divinam, quae est causa communis, sed per comparationem ad causas creatas, quas proportionaliter divina voluntas ad effectus ordinavit; ut scilicet necessariorum effectuum sint causae intransmutabiles, contingentium autem transmutabiles.”—“And therefore necessity and contingency in things are distinguished not in relation to the divine will, which is a universal cause, but in relation to created causes which the divine will has ordered proportionately to the effects, namely in such a way that the causes of necessary effects are unchangeable, and of contingent effects changeable.” See Summa theologiae [ST] I, q. 10, a. 2, resp., where Thomas speaks of the will in terms of exercise and of specification. He says that nothing (speaking of natural willing) moves the will necessarily with respect to exercise; but with respect to specification: “Et quia defectus cuiuscumque boni habet rationem non boni, ideo illud solum bonum quod est perfectum et cui nihil deficit, est tale bonum quod voluntas non potest non velle, quod est beatitudo.”—“And because the lack of whatsoever good has the nature of not-good, thus only that good that is perfect and which is lacking in nothing, is the good that the will can not not-will, which is happiness.” 248 Steven A. Long defect? (2) If we deny that divine non-upholding in good is required for evil to occur, are we not faced with precisely the same problem in God continuing to cause the being of those who are defective agents, something even more directly necessary for evil than the permissive will since non-existent agents do not cause anything? On an analogous analysis to that of Maritain’s, is not even a Maritainian, or a proponent of Marín-Sola’s views, or of Father Most’s, not required to say: for God to continue to give being to Stalin is for God to be complicit in Stalin’s crimes, since if Stalin does not continue to exist he cannot be the source of further defective action? But all this falls under the same anti-Manichaean response. The divine causality of the being, true, and good of Stalin, Hitler, and Pol Pot does not account of itself for deprivation of being, true, and good in Stalin, Hitler, and Pol Pot. If no defectible creature exists, or if God does not permit it to defect, it cannot suffer defect. Nonetheless, Bañez is correct to argue that God is neither an essential, nor an indirect, nor an accidental cause of sin. God as causing the being, good, and true of some subject, does not cause evil. Yet the wider question about the goodness of the providential order remains. I wish to observe that a misreading of the text of Saint Thomas has entered into this discussion in a way that begs remedy, and has exerted distortive effects on the thought of Nicolas, and, I would argue, of Torre, Marín-Sola, Maritain, and others. Preface to a Pivotal Text of Saint Thomas: The Defectibility of Human Nature The human creature is by reason of its experimental and discursive reason, and owing to the composite character of human nature which involves the appetites, a defectible agent even with respect to the proportionate natural good. This is prior to any actual defect or sin whatsoever, representing the potential for these. For the human agent to be defectible in this way is simply for it to be potentially subject to defect. This is not yet moral defect, but is the conditio sine qua non for it, and did this not obtain it would not be so much as possible for human nature to suffer defect. Thus, for example, on at least many readings of Saint Thomas with which I myself have sympathy, the angels are not defectible agents with respect to their proportionate natural good (because they receive perfectly adequate infused species from God and suffer no appetite that may introduce discrepancy with willing natural good) while yet they are defectible with respect to revelation God and the Permission of Evil 249 (which exceeds all proportion to any and every creature).9 In the case of the angels, they no more than any other creature may connaturally know the hidden things of God, but require grace for this, and so they may err regarding revelation. In the case of the human creature, there is by nature the possibility for bodily corruption, but also for inward distraction of appetite, de facto initial ignorance of many things, and the slow, discursive, and experimental character of human knowledge that likewise render us susceptible to error. Thus human nature is defectible not merely “physically” but also intellectually and morally. But defectibility is “ontological” or “real,” that 9 See ST I, q. 62, a. 1: “Respondeo dicendum quod nomine beatitudinis intelligitur ultima perfectio rationalis seu intellectualis naturae, et inde est quod naturaliter desideratur, quia unumquodque naturaliter desiderat suam ultimam perfectionem. Ultima autem perfectio rationalis seu intellectualis naturae est duplex. Una quidem, quam potest assequi virtute suae naturae, et haec quodammodo beatitudo vel felicitas dicitur. Unde et Aristoteles perfectissimam hominis contemplationem, qua optimum intelligibile, quod est Deus, contemplari potest in hac vita, dicit esse ultimam hominis felicitatem. Sed super hanc felicitatem est alia felicitas, quam in futuro expectamus, qua videbimus Deum sicuti est. Quod quidem est supra cuiuslibet intellectus creati naturam, ut supra ostensum est. Sic igitur dicendum est quod, quantum ad primam beatitudinem, quam Angelus assequi virtute suae naturae potuit, fuit creatus beatus. Quia perfectionem huiusmodi Angelus non acquirit per aliquem motum discursivum, sicut homo, sed statim ei adest propter suae naturae dignitatem, ut supra dictum est. Sed ultimam beatitudinem, quae facultatem naturae excedit, Angeli non statim in principio suae creationis habuerunt, quia haec beatitudo non est aliquid naturae, sed naturae finis; et ideo non statim eam a principio debuerunt habere.”— “It should be said that by beatitude is understood the ultimate perfection of rational or intellectual nature, and hence it is that it is naturally desired, since everything naturally desires its ultimate perfection. But the ultimate perfection of rational or intellectual nature is twofold. One which may be secured by the power of its nature, and this in a certain way [quodammodo] is said to be beatitude or happiness. Thus for Aristotle the most perfect contemplation of man whereby the highest intelligible, which is God, is able to be contemplated is in this life said to be the ultimate happiness. But above this happiness there is another happiness, to which we look forward in the future, whereby we shall see God as He is. But this is beyond any created nature, as is shown above. Thus it should be said that as regards the first beatitude, which the angel secures by virtue of its natural power, he was created already blessed, because the angel does not acquire this kind of perfection by any progressive/discursive motion, as does man, but rather possesses it straightway, according to the dignity of its nature, as observed above [q. 58, aa. 3–4]. But the angel did not have from the beginning of its creation the ultimate beatitude which exceeds the faculty of nature, because this beatitude is not something of nature but the end of nature; and thus this has not been due to them straightway from the beginning.” 250 Steven A. Long is, it pertains analogically to the natural susceptibility of the creature to non-being, to other defects of nature (illness, harm), to intellectual error, and to defective intention, choice, or action, including sin. And this natural defectibility pertains even to the proportionate natural good (arguably unlike the case of the angels, who are created with perfect infused species leaving no room for error regarding their natural good). Not merely with respect to the material order, but intellectually and morally, the human person is naturally susceptible to defect, without being naturally defective. A Pivotal Text of Saint Thomas Human judgment—both speculative and practical—is naturally susceptible to possible defect.10 It is here that we come to a pivotal interpretation of the words of Saint Thomas Aquinas that Marín-Sola and Torre share with the essay of Nicolas in which he disavowed his earlier analysis of the divine permission of evil. Clearly an understanding of the defectible character of human nature strongly impacts our understanding of the words of Saint Thomas regarding the divine non-upholding of the creature in good in the case of sin. To quote Saint Thomas: To sin is nothing else than to fall from the good which belongs to any being according to its nature. Now as every created thing has no being unless from another, and considered in itself is nothing, so does it need to be conserved by another in the good which pertains to its nature. For it can of itself fall from good, just as of itself it can fall into nonbeing, unless it is conserved by God.11 Torre—and Nicolas, too, in his essay disavowing the traditional account12—consider that the understanding of Thomas’s teaching forwarded by Bañez (and, of course, many others), indicates an error of 10 11 12 Not, of course, in every respect—regarding their per se objects, the powers are not in error—but with regard to reasoning and judging, in certain respects in relation to perception (which itself may suffer some defects), and vis-a-vis ordinacy of appetite. ST I-II, q. 109, a. 2, ad 2: “Dicendum quod peccare nihil aliud est quam deficere a bono quod convenit alicui secundum suam naturam. Unaquaeque autem res creata, sicut esse non habet nisi ab alio, et in se considerata nihil est, ita indiget conservari in bono suae naturae convenienti ab alio. Potest enim per seipsam deficere a bono, sicut et per seipsam potest deficere in non esse, nisi divinitus conservaretur.” See Jean-Hervé Nicolas, “La volont´salvigique de Dieu contarié par le péché, Revue thomiste 92 (1992): 177–96. It would be an entirely further essay to point God and the Permission of Evil 251 thinking that “all natural failure in being (esse) derives from not being upheld by an extrinsic cause.”13 Nicolas argued that “if the non-conservation of the creature in being, which would be the annihilation of a creature, is contrary to the wisdom and goodness of God, how much more would be its non-conservation in the good that would make it evil!”14 Here, Thomas’s lines from ST I-II, q. 109, a. 2, ad 2, clearly are taken to refer to the withholding of being in the sense of the annihilation of the creature, and so one is encouraged to view the reference to non-upholding in good as likewise a simple reference to annihilation of good. It is true that the creature of itself is nothing, or in other words, it is true that what the creature possesses exclusively of itself rather than from God, is only that which Thomas in the Scriptum on the Sentences calls an “order to a pre-existing nothingness.”15 And it does lie within the simple power of God to annihilate creatures, although this appears contrary to fittingness and the divine wisdom, as it could occur neither by nature nor by miracle.16 But this does not seem to be the principal reference of ST I-II, q. 109, a. 2, ad 2, because quite apart from annihilation, the creature that loses esse, ceases as such to exist. Thus, even with respect to the person as integral totality after death, Thomas will say that “My soul may be in heaven but I am not.”17 While clearly the divine causality in being implies the divine power 13 14 15 16 17 out what seem to me to be errors of detail in Torre’s treatment of prominent Dominican Thomistic commentators regarding this point. Torre, Do Not Resist, 245. Nicolas, “La volont´salvigique,” 186: “Si la non-conservation dans l'être que serait l'anéantissement d'une créature est conraire à la sagesse et à la bonté de Dieu, combien plus le serait sa non-à la sagesse et à la bonté de Dieu, combien plus le serait sa non-conservation dans le bien qui la ferait mauvaise!” In II sent., d. 1, q. 1, a. 2, resp.: “Tum ita quod remaneat ordo creationis ad nihil praeexistens, ut affirmatus; ut dicatur creatio esse ex nihilo, quia res creata naturaliter prius habet non esse quam esse.”— “Still there remains the order of creation to a pre-existing nothingness, as affirmed; as creation is said to be from nothing, because the created thing naturally has non-being prior to being.” In ST I, q. 104, a. 3, Thomas argues that God possesses the power to annihilate any creature; but in q. 104, a. 4, Thomas argues that insofar as God acts in accord with nature this does not occur, and that it does not pertain to God acting miraculously or to God as giving grace that he annihilate, so that no creature is annihilated. See Thomas’s commentary on 1 Cor 15: 12–19: “Impossibile autem est quod illud quod est naturale et per se, sit finitum et quasi nihil; et illud quod est contra naturam et per accidens, sit infinitum, si anima semper duret sine corpore. Et ideo Platonici ponentes immortalitatem, posuerunt reincorporationem, licet hoc sit haereticum: et ideo si mortui non resurgunt, solum in hac vita confidentes erimus. Alio modo quia constat quod homo naturaliter desiderat salutem sui 252 Steven A. Long to annihilate, there is no constraint to suppose that by referring to “falling from being” Thomas is referring specifically and exclusively to the case of divine annihilation. To the contrary, things fall from being every day that are not annihilated, that is, they cease to enjoy actual being.18 It would be odd to say that creatures that have been destroyed have nonetheless been “upheld in being” by God merely because they were not annihilated, that is, merely because not nothing but rather some material residue remained following their destruction: because the integral being of the creature is not the same as some material residue of the creature consequent on its destruction. That God has the power to withhold being simpliciter is true; but the ordinary mode in which human persons lose being is by physically perishing; the one who physically perishes is not, at the instant of perishing, being upheld in physical being by God; and physically perishing is not being annihilated. Similarly, the ordinary way in which a creature is permitted to fall, is not “annihilation” of moral good, but through non-upholding of the creature from its own defectibility with respect to good. 18 ipsius, anima autem cum sit pars corporis hominis, non est totus homo, et anima mea non est ego; unde licet anima consequatur salutem in alia vita, non tamen ego vel quilibet homo. Et praeterea cum homo naturaliter desideret salutem, etiam corporis, frustraretur naturale desiderium.”— “But it is impossible that what is natural and per se be finite and, as it were, nothing; and that which is against nature and per accidens be infinite, if the soul endures without the body. And so, the Platonists positing immortality, posited re-incorporation, although this is heretical. Therefore, if the dead do not rise, we will be confident only in this life. In another way, because it is clear that man naturally desires his own salvation; but the soul, since it is part of man’s body, is not an entire man, and my soul is not I; hence, although the soul obtains salvation in another life, nevertheless, not I or any man. Furthermore, since man naturally desires salvation even of the body, a natural desire would be frustrated” (Super I Cor 15, lec. 2). Of course, the argument from natural desire regards fittingness rather than impossibility, as Thomas notes elsewhere (in the Scriptum on the Sentences) that natural desire is insusceptible of frustration only when it is for something proportionate to human nature. Cf. Thomas’s In II sent., d. 1, a. 2, resp.: “Tum ita quod remaneat ordo creationis ad nihil praeexistens, ut affirmatus; ut dicatur creatio esse ex nihilo, quia res creata naturaliter prius habet non esse quam esse; et si haec duo sufficiant ad rationem creationis, sic creatio potest demonstrari, et sic philosophi creationem posuerunt.”— “The order of creation then remains to a pre-existing nothing, as affirmed; as creation is said to be affirmed to be from nothing because the created thing naturally has non-being prior to being …” The remainder of the passage carries on referring to a prior point, that creation is not from some antecedent thing, then stating “and if these two are sufficient for the meaning of creation, thus creation is said to be demonstrable, and thus philosophers have held creation.” God and the Permission of Evil 253 Of course the case of the immortal rational soul is different: but even here, the immortal soul is not complete in its species and is not simply by itself the composite being, howsoever much the esse in which it subsists is numerically identical with the esse of the composite. If the human person falls from being, the person as such—as the perfection of integral totality, as the “that which” once had being–no longer exists. The immortally subsisting rational soul is personal: it subsists with the numerically identical esse of the composite, but it is not this composite but only an incomplete substance containing the (admittedly personal) principle and formal germinus of that composite. It might be said by analogy to be a person in virtute, but it is not the integral totality of the person. In any case, the more proximate sense of Thomas’s passage refers to a creature’s susceptibility to non-being if it not be upheld, and this point analogically extends to the upholding of the creature in its good. It is true that if God does not uphold a creature in good, it will not be upheld, because God is the first cause of every being, form, and motion19 (and being is convertible with good, so if the creature is not upheld in that degree of act requisite for some good, it will not be upheld in the good). But for God not to uphold a thing in being, it is not necessary for God to annihilate it: it is enough that through the permission of material corruption esse is withdrawn. Every time a composite being is corrupted, that very thing that existed is no more, and that thing has not been upheld in its being. It is within the divine power to uphold a peach from all corruption and were God to do so, this would be the “peachiest” peach in history. But God does not owe the peach that it be upheld from all defect of corruption, and for the peach to be created with a principle of matter rendering it susceptible to the defect of corruption does not make its creation evil or defective. Of course, were God to uphold it, it would not be corrupted. Yet it has of itself its susceptibility to the defect of bodily corruption. The peach will, at any time, if God permits, suffer corruption. This is not annihilation, but rather the ordinary non-conservation in being of creatures that include matter in their substantial natures. It is true for the human person too: God does not by nature owe man bodily incorruption, and if God does not uphold man in being, man will suffer corruption and will “fall into nonbeing.” For the integral totality of the person ends with death—has fallen into non-being, which is to say, the person of Socrates as integral totality no longer exists, although the rational soul (which is personal, because the esse of the soul is numerically identical with that of 19 See ST I-II, q. 109, a. 1, resp. 254 Steven A. Long the composite20) endures. Again, this is not to deny that annihilation lies within the divine power, but that is not the sense of falling from being that is in question here, and its specter is raised by Thomas’s words solely for the purpose of indicating that the entirety of created being and good is a divine effect. This point regarding defectibility pertains analogically to the nature and powers of the human creature, which are not by nature defective, but which are in certain particular respects defectible. Accordingly, this observation pertains both to the physical and to the moral order, since what is involved is the perfection of the creature through its actuations in nature and grace. The human creature can of itself fall from being—it has an intrinsic principle susceptible of corruption, matter, which Thomas clearly teaches makes the person by nature corruptible21—although it may be upheld from corruption (as happened through the praeternatural gift of bodily incorruptibility, happens for a time during bodily life owing to the providential sustenance in esse through the concatenation of natural causes, and is wholly transcended in the elevated mode of the glorified body at the resurrection). Likewise, the creature can of itself fall from the good pertaining to its nature if it not be upheld in this good by God. We are ordered to many goods, but we are defectible with respect to attaining, and habitually enjoying, these goods. As Saint Thomas argues in De veritate, q. 22, a. 6, ad 3, “the fact that the will is able to be bent to evil, it has not according as it is from God, but according as it is from nothing.”22 20 21 22 ST I, q. 76, a. 1, ad 5: “Ad quintum dicendum quod anima illud esse in quo ipsa subsistit, communicat materiae corporali, ex qua et anima intellectiva fit unum, ita quod illud esse quod est totius compositi, est etiam ipsius animae. Quod non accidit in aliis formis, quae non sunt subsistentes. Et propter hoc anima humana remanet in suo esse, destructo corpore, non autem aliae formae.”— “To the fifth it should be said that the soul communicates that existence in which it subsists to the corporeal matter, out of which with the intellective soul results one existence, such that the existence of the whole composite is that of the soul.” De malo, q. 5 a. 5 resp.: “Sic ergo mors et corruptio naturalis est homini secundum necessitatem materiae; sed secundum rationem formae esset ei conveniens immortalitas; ad quam tamen praestandam naturae principia non sufficiunt; sed aptitudo quaedam naturalis ad eam convenit homini secundum animam; complementum autem eius est ex supernaturali virtute.”— “Therefore death and corruption pertains to man’s nature according to the necessity of matter; but according to the nature of his form immortality would have befitted him for which natural principles are insufficient. But a certain aptitude of nature with respect to it befits man according to his soul, while the fulfillment of it is from supernatural power.” De veritate, q. 22: “quod voluntas sit flexibilis ad malum, non habet secundum God and the Permission of Evil 255 Further, God does not owe the defectible creature that it be upheld from all defect. It is precisely for this reason that Saint Thomas writes of God, in ST I-II, q. 79, a. 1, resp., that “if someone sin it is not imputable to Him as though He were the cause of that sin; even as a pilot is not said to cause the wrecking of the ship, through not steering the ship, unless he cease to steer while able and bound to steer. It is therefore evident that God is nowise a cause of sin.”23 God is not bound to uphold the defectible creature from all defect. Thomas expressly considers whether it would not have been better had God created man in immutable possession of the ultimate good in the beatific vision, and rejects this because it is unfitting that one enjoy the absolutely transcendent good with no effort or trial.24 In permitting 23 24 quod est a Deo, sed secundum quod est de nihilo.” ST I-II, q. 79, a. 1, resp.: “Contingit enim quod Deus aliquibus non praebet auxilium ad vitandum peccata, quod si praeberet, non peccarent. Sed hoc totum facit secundum ordinem suae sapientiae et iustitiae, cum ipse sit sapientia et iustitia. Unde non imputatur ei quod alius peccat, sicut causae peccati, sicut gubernator non dicitur causa submersionis navis ex hoc quod non gubernat navem, nisi quando subtrahit gubernationem potens et debens gubernare. Et sic patet quod Deus nullo modo est causa peccati.”—“For it happens that God does not give some the assistance, whereby they may avoid sin, which assistance were He to give, they would not sin. But He does all this according to the order of His wisdom and justice, since He Himself is Wisdom and Justice: so that if someone sin it is not imputable to Him as though He were the cause of that sin; even as a pilot is not said to cause the wrecking of the ship, through not steering the ship, unless he cease to steer while able and bound to steer. It is therefore evident that God is nowise a cause of sin.” ST I-II, q. 5, a. 7, resp. Thomas first acknowledges that the right order of the will to the end is necessary for happiness, and then states: “Sed ex hoc non ostenditur quod aliqua operatio hominis debeat praecedere eius beatitudinem, posset enim Deus simul facere voluntatem recte tendentem in finem, et finem consequentem; sicut quandoque simul materiam disponit, et inducit formam. Sed ordo divinae sapientiae exigit ne hoc fiat, ut enim dicitur in II De caelo, eorum quae nata sunt habere bonum perfectum, aliquid habet ipsum sine motu, aliquid uno motu, aliquid pluribus. Habere autem perfectum bonum sine motu, convenit ei quod naturaliter habet illud. Habere autem beatitudinem naturaliter est solius Dei. Unde solius Dei proprium est quod ad beatitudinem non moveatur per aliquam operationem praecedentem. Cum autem beatitudo excedat omnem naturam creatam, nulla pura creatura convenienter beatitudinem consequitur absque motu operationis, per quam tendit in ipsam.”—“But this does not show that any work of man needs to precede his happiness, for God could simultaneously make the will to tend rightly toward the end and to attain the end: Thus at times God disposes the matter and simultaneously induces the form. But the order of divine wisdom necessitates that this not be, for as is said in II De caelo, of those things that have perfect good, some have it without motion, some with by one motion, and others by many motions. But to have perfect good without motion belongs to 256 Steven A. Long the defectible creature to suffer defect, God simply withholds special aid which is not in justice due, while nonetheless giving to all help far surpassing what is due (for no person lacks sufficient grace for salvation). God, in not upholding the creature who sins, does not cause this sin, any more than God, who does not uphold the peach in its freshness, causes its ensuing defect of corruption. The peach is not evil or “corrupt” by nature owing to its susceptibility to corruption. Nor is man morally evil by nature owing to defectibility—susceptibility to defect—with respect to the moral good. The defectibility of human nature analogically pertains to, and passes through, human reason, will, appetite, operations, and organic bodily perfections and dispositions (although manifestly not every act of a natural power is defectible).25 God moves things according to their natures, and so he permits among rational creatures the suffering of some physical, some intellectual, and some moral, defect, while providing more aid to each than is due to any or even all compositely. As God cannot not know what the implications of such defect are, he is said to “reprobate” in not upholding the creature in the case where the defect of the creature is final impenitence. While we do not know the extent of such divine permission of final failure to persevere in grace, we do know that the root of such failure is the defectibility of the creature. We also know the truth that for a creature that is defectible even regarding its proportionate natural good, God does not owe certain 25 that which naturally possesses it. But to have happiness naturally belongs solely to God. Wherefore it is proper to God alone that he not be moved to happiness by any preceding operation. For happiness exceeds every created nature, and no pure creature can fittingly achieve happiness without the motion of operation whereby it tends toward it.” Manifestly nature is not in every respect defectible, since in regard to the proper objects of the human powers, these powers do not err. See ST I, q. 85, a. 6: “Quia ad proprium obiectum unaquaeque potentia per se ordinatur, secundum quod ipsa. Quae autem sunt huiusmodi, semper eodem modo se habent. Unde manente potentia, non deficit eius iudicium circa proprium obiectum.—Obiectum autem proprium intellectus est quidditas rei. Unde circa quidditatem rei, per se loquendo, intellectus non fallitur. Sed circa ea quae circumstant rei essentiam vel quidditatem, intellectus potest falli, dum unum ordinat ad aliud, vel componendo vel dividendo vel etiam ratiocinando.”—“Because every faculty, as such, is per se ordered to its proper object. But things of this kind are always the same. Thus, as long as the faculty exists, its judgment concerning its own proper object does not fail.—But the proper object of the intellect is the ‘quiddity’ of a thing. Wherefore, properly speaking, about the quiddity of the thing the intellect does not fail. But about that which surrounds the essence or quiddity of the thing, the intellect is able to fail, as also about the order of one to another, or about composition or division, or in reasoning.” God and the Permission of Evil 257 preservation from all defect with respect to the infinitely transcendent supernatural good. Such upholding is a gift which the permitted defect of some impedes. It befits creation of an order containing defectible free creatures that some measure of defect be permitted, and that in some case this may imply the defect of final impenitence is not a singular willing of evil to some creature, but a permission following upon the willing of an order that contains creatures such as ourselves, an order willed as the conditio sine qua non for creatures such as ourselves. In the permission of defect God—who does not owe the defectible creature to uphold it from all defect—cannot fail to know what this implies with respect to man’s relation to grace, while yet nonetheless this divine permission regards what is befitting to the order he has chosen to create and is not a positive and absolute will to harm any creature. That God cannot “not know” that this involves loss, does not render the loss to be either directly or accidentally caused by God, while yet the order caused by God—containing defectible creatures—is the condition of any such defect. Of course, nothing in this addresses the question of the extension of actual final impenitence, which apart from positive revelation is unknowable. Review of Question and Diagnosis of the Common Error of Maritain and Marín-Sola To review the question, why is divine non-upholding in good not equivalent to God at least accidentally “causing” the creature “necessarily to sin”? We have already observed, with Bañez, that for God not specially to uphold the defectible creature is not properly the cause of its defection: obviously not the per se cause (because evil as such has no per se cause) but not even accidental, because nothing in the agency of God reaches to the sin as such. God does not cause such defect, any more than one who does not provide a beggar special aid causes his poverty. We have also seen that Thomas rightly teaches that acts ought to be deemed necessary and contingent according to their proximate cause and not according to their relation to God.26 The creature’s actions are free 26 De malo, q. 16, a. 7, ad 15: “Et ideo necessitas et contingentia in rebus distinguuntur non per habitudinem ad voluntatem divinam, quae est causa communis, sed per comparationem ad causas creatas, quas proportionaliter divina voluntas ad effectus ordinavit; ut scilicet necessariorum effectuum sint causae intransmutabiles, contingentium autem transmutabiles.”— “And therefore necessity and contingency in things are distinguished not in relation to the divine will, which is a universal cause, but in relation to created causes which the divine will has ordered proportionately to the effects, namely in such a way that the causes of necessary effects are unchangeable, and of contingent effects changeable.” 258 Steven A. Long contingent acts which are deemed so because they derive from a rational principle that cannot be compelled by any finite object and that bring forth a great variety of effects (and yet the will cannot even proceed to its act without prior divine motion, thus rightly called by many “divine premotion” in response to those who denied this was an ontologically prior motion bestowed by God, a motio realis).27 Necessity and contingency are discriminated in relation to the proximate cause, not in relation to God. That God permits the defectible creature to undergo some defect does not make the creature’s defective action un-free, lacking in responsibility, or non-culpable (any more than a peach that God permits to begin to decay was therefore “never truly a peach”). The creature has the power to act otherwise, but it is not naturally indefectible. For God to create naturally indefectible creatures with respect to their natural good is possible (the angels), but for him to create creatures naturally indefectible with respect to their supernatural end is impossible (even the angels are not such). Indefectibility with respect to the supernatural good is achievable only if free creatures are created in the beatific vision. God may contingently uphold even a naturally defectible creature in natural or supernatural good, but this, too, is not due to it (whereas, to a creature in the beatific vision it is properly due that it be immutably fixed in good). Contrary to Nicolas’ disavowal of his earlier account, and to Torre, Marín-Sola, Maritain, Most, Dom Pontifex, and others, the divine permission of moral evil understood as a non-upholding in good is the withholding of a special divine preservation (whether in the order of nature or of grace) that is not in justice owed to the defectible creature, and which plays a role both in the divine tutoring of man, and in the manifestation of the profundity and merciful goodness of God who gives to each more than in strict justice is due to any. The rejection of this account by Maritain and Marín-Sola is rendered easier by their seemingly unintentional but real rejection of the systematic implications of the divine transcendence and simplicity. God either causes some determinate effect or not, and the creature cannot absolutely speaking “add to” what God brings about as though the creature were “outside” the zone of the created divine effect: not even “in slight matters” (although not every upholding is that of grace, there is also natural premotion with 27 Yet, the least motion of the creature requires prior divine motion, for as Thomas notes in ST I-II, q. 109, a. 1, no creature whatsoever can so much as proceed to its act unless it first be moved by God. The creature is not its own operation and must be divinely moved to achieve the dignity of agency, even when this agency is that of self-motion. God and the Permission of Evil 259 respect to the application of every power to act). Rather, the creature and its free actions lie within rather than without the zone of the effect of divine causality. Labourdette famously criticized Maritain’s account, on the ground that the “breakable motion,” not achieving its terminus, would be no motion at all, precisely because it did not achieve its terminus (something impossible with respect to any motion simply willed by God). I am not sure that the thought of Maritain is fully matured, at least in what he has set out in this Brief Treatise [referring to the French title, Court traité de l’existence et de l’existant]; and there is at least one difficulty that I do not see is effectively removed. What is this broken motion? What is in the creature? What did it do? It actuates a good act that does not take place. . . . Let us not say that it “stops on the way,” because this action of the free act is instantaneous. Now, we have observed and insisted: if there is no movement in the creature, there is no motion at all. To this objection Maritain replied in a note in which he proposes to say that this motion, breakable as to the specification, always leads to the exercise of an act, either the good one or the bad one. . . . I misunderstood this distinction, which seems to return to an indifferent motion; there is no motion, and therefore no definite motion, specified by its term. But moreover, and, happily, it is not very coherent with what else he maintains very precisely in his text: if the breakable motion is indeed broken, there is another unbreakable motion, which ensures that there is (something) positive and real in the bad act. If it is really another motion, the first does not even reach the exercise of the only act which is actually done and which is bad; it did not do anything in the creature; so to speak: it had no reality, there was no motion at all. Let us repeat it again: it is repugnant that God moves and the creature is not moved, it is repugnant that God is acting in the creature and there is no act in the creature. It is repugnant that this movement exists without being specified by its term. On the other hand, if it is admitted that it is the same motion, first ordered to the good, which, once broken, gives the wrong act, supposing that one can distinguish these stages thus, one no longer escapes from the indifferent motion 260 Steven A. Long of Molinism, a motion for our purposes that we make efficacious through our will.28 Maritain taught, in his formal response to Labourdette’s criticisms, that God can move something toward one determinate effect, but that this motion may be made further actually determinate in another and distinct respect by the human agent by virtue of a “non-shattering” or “non-negation” that of itself requires no additional divine motion or causality for the agent to achieve (i.e., if the creature does not “shatter” or “negate” or “nihilate” the motion, then efficacious motion is given, but the “non-shattering” requires no more aid than is given to the one who actually “shatters” the divine motion). The infallibly realized initial effect of the simple divine will would then according to Maritain be merely some motion of attraction or perhaps even merely some consideration of good by the agent, which if not negated or shattered God would then perfect with an efficacious motion.29 28 29 Michel Labourdette, O.P., Cours de Theologie Morale, 7, De la Grace, p. 52: “Je ne suis pas sûr que la pensée de Maritain soit entièrement mûrie, du moins quand il a r´sif´le Court Traité; et il y a au moins une difficulté dont je ne vois pas qui’il soit efficacement sorti. Qu’est-ce que c’est que cette motion brisée? Qu’est-elle dans la créature? Qu’est-ce qu’elle a fait? Elle actue un acte bon qui n’a pas lieu… Ne disons pas qu’elle “s’arrête en chemin”, car cette actuation de l’acte libre est instantanée. Or, nous l’avons vu et répéte´: s’il n’y a pas de mouvement dans la créature, il n’y a pas de motion du tout. A cette objection Maritain a répondu dans une note où il propose de dire que cetto motion, brisable quant à la spécification, aboutit toujours à l’exercice d’un acte, soit le bon, soit le mauvais… Je saisis mal cette distinction, qui paraît revenir à une motion indifférente; il n’y a de mouvement et donc de motion que déterminé, spécifié par son terme. Mais en outre, et hereusement, ce n’est plu très cohérent avec ce que par ailleurs il maintient très justement dans son texte: si la motion brisable est effectivement brisée, c’est une autre motion imbrisable celle-là, qui assure ce qu’ill y a de positif et de réel dans l’acte mauvais. Si c’est vraiment une autre motion, la premiere n’atteint même pas l’exercice du seul acte qui soit effectivement posé at qui est mauvais; elle n’a donc rien fait dans la créature; autant dire: elle n’a pas eu de réalité, il n’y a pas eu de motion du tout. Répétons-le encore: il répugne que Dieu meuve et que la créature ne soit pas mue, il répugne que Dieu actue la créature et qu’il n’y ait pas d’acte dans la créature. Il répugne que ce mouvement existe sans être spécifié par son terme. Si, par contre, on admet que c’est la même motion, d’abord ordonnée au bien, qui, une fois brisée, donne l’acte mauvais, à supposer qu’on puisse distinguer ainsi ces étapes, on n’échappe plus à la motion indifférente du molinisme, motion que nous raisons efficace per notre vouloir.” Maritain, God and the Permission of Evil, 56–57, esp. 57: “And the movement or tendency in question toward the good (and at the same stroke toward the consideration of the rule) which the action of God causes to be born in us from any one God and the Permission of Evil 261 One might think that Labourdette could have ceded even more than he did and still sustain his criticism of Maritain: because even if what God causes is merely the least attraction, God’s granting of further efficacious aid whereby the creature is actually moved to the due good is required for motion to the due good. Of course, the problem is that this is strictly a voluntary motion which either occurs or does not, being a spiritual and instantaneous motion: so that God cannot be said to grant a motion toward something without positing this very motion (unless we deny the divine simplicity and define motion as being in God and not solely in the creature). But even this point that voluntary motion as a spiritual immutation either occurs or does not, and that so it is not “partial,” may be ceded away for purposes of argument. It is sufficient to observe that that which God simply wills occurs, and that if divine motion is given only for a “partial motion” then this is all that will occur apart from any further efficacious divine motion. Further, such motion is not predicated on prior “non-negation” or “non-shattering” of a “shatterable” motion, precisely because in a real subject the negation of negation must necessarily be something positive of which God is the first cause. Thus, for the creature “not to negate” is no different than for the creature to be actually moved by God, and so one divine motion has been eternally ordained by God through another, each of which is simply efficacious with respect to whatever it is ordained to effectuate. Thus, howsoever much or little aid is bestowed to the creature, this— and no other—will be the degree of the creature’s actuation. That an effect of the simple divine will may or may not be realized—as though universal causality were inferior to particular causality—is contrary to the divine simplicity and transcendence. Of course, as already observed, inasmuch as the spiritual motion of the will is a simple immutation, the divine motion of the above mentioned occurrences—this is the effect produced in the soul by the shatterable motion: an effect which will itself be shattered if and when this motion from which it proceeds is shattered.” But the “shattering” is a negation, and in a real subject negation of negation is something positive which is caused by God. Maritain does not deny it is caused by God, but seems to think that the creature can itself “add” to the shatterable motion that by which it is not shattered: but that by which it is not shattered, is that further increment of actuality bestowed by God. The same motion does not indifferently achieve or not achieve the effect. And insofar as the efficacity of God is solely toward X, then X is what is, and not X plus this further blossom of act which if it comes to be—if it is—must be actually and determinately achieved through the divine aid. Put differently: whatever accounts for the agent’s further act, is determinately a divine gift. This objection pertains also to all accounts of this species, e.g., those of Marín-Sola, Most, et al. 262 Steven A. Long must achieve some voluntary effect. But even if we allow the idea of a “partial” motion, this would be some degree of act dependent on God, and no further actuation could occur apart from further divine aid. Marín-Sola seems to proceed even further than Maritain, and to argue that the motion sufficient for one effect can simply be applied by the agent to another effect without further divine aid, at least in cases of only “slight” resistance.30 But this is to say that in “slight” matters an agent can bring something from nothing, that an agent in potency does not need prior divine motion in order to proceed to act. Thus this argument appears even less defensible in itself, and less compatible with the teaching of Saint Thomas Aquinas, than is Maritain’s account. Nicolas offered similar criticism to that of Labourdette, predicated likewise on the proposition that a divine motion must achieve some effect in order to be a motion, and with respect to whatever that effect is, the motion is necessarily efficacious. Thus Nicolas wrote of the “shatterable” motion: On the other hand, what makes a new and to my mind insoluble difficulty, is the very notion of a motion that is not effective by itself: or, more exactly, though it finally comes down to the same thing, the notion of a prevented motion. Such a motion in effect would be devoid of any reality: it would not exist in the creature, who by hypothesis would not be moved, nor in God who is immutable and in whom I cannot discern a motion intelligibly except by reference to a modification of the created: Tota mutatio se tenet ex parte creaturae. What is it that God sends when He is said to send a motion that is prevented from moving the creature to the act at which it was aimed?31 Nicolas continues a bit further (referring to Francisco Muñiz, who defended the idea of God bringing forth a motion without the term defining it as the motion it is): 30 31 Torre, Do Not Resist, 120n34. Nicolas, “La permission du péché,” Revue thomiste 60, no. 1 (1960): 5–37, at 33: “Ce qui fait par contre une difficulté nouvelle, et à mon sens insoluble, c’est la notion même d’une motion non efficace par elle-même: ou, plus exactement, mais cela finalement revient au même, la notion d’une motion empêchée. Une telle motion en effect serait dépourvue de toute réalité: elle n’existerait pas dans la créature, qui par hypothése ne serait pas mue, ni en Dieu qui est immuable et en qui je ne puis disgnuer une motion de maniére intelligible que par référence à une modification du créé: Tota mutatio se tenet ex parte creaturae. Qu’est-ce donc que Dieu envoie quand il est dit envoyer une motion qui est empêchée de conduire la créature à l’acte qu’elle visait?” God and the Permission of Evil 263 To say that the reality of this motion consists in this, that this election is really begun by the application of the soul to the final end is to say nothing for these contradict each other. It is to say nothing, for this concerns a motion determined to this act of election, and it cannot be found save in the will really moved to elicit it, and thus in the will eliciting. Or it is self-contradictory, admitting that the motion, allegedly determined, is in reality an undifferentiated motion toward the good in general, and this alleged determined election, as far as it is understood, resides with a crowd of others equally possible in the general will of the good. Here again, it suffices to exclude this explanation to return to Father Muñiz himself, who has so masterfully established the necessity of admitting for every created act a physical, determined, divine premotion.32 Here again Nicolas could have conceded more for purposes of argument and still sustained his criticism (which is not to say that I think his argument above to be faulty). That is to say, that whatsoever effect God simply wills—even if it be but Maritain’s “passing attraction” or “nudge” toward the good—will infallibly and certainly be achieved. Further, aid given beyond this is not conditioned on “non-negation” for the reason we have seen above (namely, that the non-negation in question is in fact some positive actuation received from God because in a real subject negation of negation must be something positive of which God accordingly is the first cause). Even if from all eternity the “sufficient” (in relation to something else) grace is meant only to bring about a “passing attraction” it must efficaciously achieve such an effect, and on the basis of this aid alone, this is what will occur, neither more nor less. Here, for purpose of argument one concedes that not the per se end, but merely some degree of actuality with even the greatest degree of remotion from a full positive act (provided it is a determinate degree of act) could answer to this 32 Nicolas, “La permission du péché,” 34: “Dire que la réalité de cette motion consiste en ceci que cette élection est réelement comencée par l’application de l’âme à la fin dernière, c’est ne rien dire ou se contredire. Ne rien dire, car il s’agit de la motion déterminée à cet acte d’élection, et elle ne peut se trouver que dans la volonté réellement mue à l’éliciter, donc dans la volont´l’élicitant. Ou c’est se contredire, en admettant que la motion, dite déterminée, est en réalite une motion indifférenciée, au bien en général, et à cette élection déterminée, en tant qu’elle est comprise, avec une foule d’autres également possible, dans le vouloir général du bien. Là encore, il suffit de reenvoyer au P. Muñiz lui-même, qui a si magistralement établi la nécessité d’admettre pour tout acte créé une prémotion divine physique, déterminée, pour exclure cette explication.” 264 Steven A. Long need.33 Even so, the situation is not improved for the analysis of either Maritain or Marín-Sola. Allow me to quote Torre, this time from his PhD dissertation directly addressing this very objection of Nicolas: The simplest way to answer this question is to proceed in two parts. First, an impedible motion not only is intelligible but obvious. Second, the notion of such a motion can be analogously applied to the activity of intellect and will in free choice. That being done, the objection is met.34 Sed contra. Of course an impeded motion is conceivable, and one readily cedes that the world is filled with impeded motions (taken in relation to their finite causes). And, of course this analogously may apply to the activity of the intellect and will in free choice, precisely because every grace taken as an object of choice is finite and thus cannot compel the will. Further, if one considers grace either as object of choice, or if one prescinds from, brackets out, the principal causality of God, and considers grace merely as created motio, thus taken in and of itself as created effect it is impedible. But this does not matter in the least to the question at hand. It is true that grace taken as an object of choice can never compel the will, which always remains objectively free. And grace taken apart from its divine principal cause, simply as created motio, might as such and apart from God be impeded. But grace taken as a motion precisely in relation to its divine principal cause (which is the very source of its denomination as grace!) must bring about a determinate effect, and is infallibly efficacious in bringing about this determinate effect. The reason is the divine simplicity: it is impossible that God cause and that there be no effect, because God as universal and first cause, is as cause universally efficacious. Thus, if God causes, there is an actual determinate effect, and beyond this determinate effect any further degree of actuation requires a further divine ad extra effect. Most crucially, this motion is not “conditioned” by “non-negation” just as a person actually 33 34 It might be argued that only the per se effect would constitute sufficient act, but for purposes of argument one might even cede that it may be reasonable to speak of God causing the determinate actuality of “part” of a motion. The decisive point is that if this is allowed, it is only that part that is realized, and no other part can be realized without further divine aid which is either given or not. Torre, God’s Permission of Sin: Negative or Conditioned Decree? A Defense of the Doctrine of F. Marín-Sola, O.P., Based on the Principles of Thomas Aquinas, bk. 2 (Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Dissertation Services, 1983), 443. God and the Permission of Evil 265 having a nose is not “conditioned” upon “not not-having a nose.” 35 Our “not negating” is comprised in the positive effect of grace itself, which is either divinely bestowed or not. Motion is “nothing else than the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality.”36 God moves the creature to its act, and that which is not included in the divine motion is not that to which God actually moves the creature, although what God achieves may make the creature proximate to some further act (whose actual accomplishment requires still further divine aid). That God gives us an indeterminate push toward achieving one thing, which we can of ourselves make into a motion toward another thing apart from the divine aid of further motion, is a metaphysical impossibility even in “slight” matters. The key to and principle of the later shift in Thomas’s teaching toward a stronger doctrine of premotion is seen in the text of De veritate (prior to his even stronger account of applicatio which is manifest in the Summa contra gentiles and the Summa theologiae) 35 36 See De veritate, III, 28, resp.: ““Quaedam vero opposita sunt quorum alterum tantum est natura quaedam, reliquum vero non est nisi remotio vel negatio ipsius, sicut patet in oppositis secundum affirmationem et negationem, vel secundum privationem et habitum; et in talibus negatio oppositi quod ponit naturam aliquam, est realis quia est alicuius rei, negatio vero alterius oppositi non est realis, quia non est alicuius rei, est enim negatio negationis; et ideo haec negatio negationis quae est negatio alterius oppositi, nihil differt secundum rem a positione alterius; unde secundum rem idem est generatio albi et corruptio non albi. Sed quia negatio, quamvis non sit res naturae, est tamen res rationis, ideo negatio negationis secundum rationem sive secundum modum intelligendi est aliud a positione affirmationis; et sic corruptio non albi secundum modum intelligendi est aliud quam generatio albi.”— “There are other opposites of which only one of the two terms is a natural being, and the other is only its removal or negation. This appears, for instance, in opposites based upon affirmation and negation or upon privation and possession. In such cases the negation of an opposite which posits a natural being is real, because it is the negation of a real being; but the negation of the other opposite is not real, because it is not the negation of any real being. It is the negation of a negation. Consequently, this negation of a negation, which is the negation of the second opposite, in no way differs in reality from the positing of the other. In reality, then, the coming to be of white and the destruction of not-white are the same. But because a negation, though not a real being, is nevertheless a conceptual being, the negation of the negation is distinct conceptually or in our manner of understanding from the positing of the affirmation. Thus in the manner of understanding it the destruction of not-white is distinct from the coming to be of white” (emphasis mine). ST I, q. 2, a. 3, resp.: “Movere enim nihil aliud est quam educere aliquid de potentia in actum . . .”—“For motion is nothing else than the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality.” 266 Steven A. Long wherein he distinguishes between an effect in itself, and an effect taken precisely in relation to the divine power: A thing can be said to be possible in two ways. First, we may consider the potency that exists in the thing itself, as when we say that a stone can be moved downwards. Or we may consider the potency that exists in another thing, as when we say that a stone can be moved upwards, not by a potency existing in the stone, but by a potency existing in the one who hurls it. Consequently, when we say: “That predestined person can possibly die in sin,” the statement is true if we consider only the potency that exists in him. But, if we are speaking of this predestined person according to the ordering which he has to another, namely, to God, who is predestining him, that event is incompatible with this ordering, even though it is compatible with the person’s own power. Hence, we can use the distinction given above; that is, we can consider the subject with this form or without it.37 Likewise the peach in itself is corruptible, but if God wills simply to uphold it, it will be upheld. The will in choice and in every intention other than the natural willing of happiness in general is free by its nature with respect to its connatural objects, while yet the least degree of its activation or application presupposes the fecundation of prior divine motion. Or, as Thomas writes in ST I-II, q. 112, a. 3, resp.: As stated above [article 2], man’s preparation for grace is from God, as Mover, and from the free-will, as moved. Thus the preparation may be considered in two ways: first, as it is from free-will, and thus there is no necessity that it obtain grace, since the gift of grace exceeds every preparation of human power. But in another way it is able to be considered, according as it is from God the 37 De veritate, q. 6, a. 3, ad 7: “Ad septimum dicendum, quod aliquid potest dici posse dupliciter. Uno modo considerando potentiam quae in ipso est, sicut dicitur quod lapis potest moveri deorsum. Alio modo considerando id quod ex parte alterius est, sicut si dicerem, quod lapis potest moveri sursum, non per potentiam quae in ipso sit, sed per potentiam proiicientis. Cum ergo dicitur: praedestinatus iste potest in peccato mori; si consideretur potentia ipsius, verum est; si autem loquamur de praedestinato secundum ordinem quem habet ad aliud, scilicet ad Deum praedestinantem, sic ordo ille non compatitur secum istum eventum, quamvis compatiatur secum istam potentiam. Et ideo potest distingui secundum distinctionem prius inductam, scilicet cum forma, vel sine forma consideratio subiecti.” God and the Permission of Evil 267 Mover. And thus it has a necessity—not indeed of coercion, but of infallibility—with respect to that which it is ordained to by God, since God’s intention cannot fail, according to the saying of Augustine in his book on the Predestination of the Saints [De dono perseverantiae 15] that “by God’s good gifts whoever is liberated, is most certainly liberated.”38 “God’s intention cannot fail.” Or, as Thomas writes elsewhere: “If God moves the will to anything, it is incompossible with this supposition, that the will be not moved thereto. But it is not impossible simply. Wherefore it does not follow that the will is moved by God necessarily.”39 This certainly sounds as though (1) a “frustrable” motion is ruled out by Saint Thomas, and (2) if a “partial” volitional motion—a “partial” spiritual immutation— were to be possible and to be received from God, that nothing more could occur without further divine motion, a further motion which would be our “non-negation” (for in a real subject this must be ontologically positive, and so bestowed from God). 38 39 ST I-II, q. 112, a. 3, resp.: “Respondeo dicendum quod, sicut supra dictum est, praeparatio ad hominis gratiam est a Deo sicut a movente, a libero autem arbitrio sicut a moto. Potest igitur praeparatio dupliciter considerari. Uno quidem modo, secundum quod est a libero arbitrio. Et secundum hoc, nullam necessitatem habet ad gratiae consecutionem, quia donum gratiae excedit omnem praeparationem virtutis humanae. Alio modo potest considerari secundum quod est a Deo movente. Et tunc habet necessitatem ad id ad quod ordinatur a Deo, non quidem coactionis, sed infallibilitatis, quia intentio Dei deficere non potest; secundum quod et Augustinus dicit, in libro de Praedest. Sanct., quod per beneficia Dei certissime liberantur quicumque liberantur. Unde si ex intentione Dei moventis est quod homo cuius cor movet, gratiam consequatur, infallibiliter ipsam consequitur; secundum illud Ioan. VI, omnis qui audivit a patre et didicit, venit ad me.” ST I-II, q. 10, a. 4, ad 3: “Ad tertium dicendum quod, si Deus movet voluntatem ad aliquid, incompossibile est huic positioni quod voluntas ad illud non moveatur. Non tamen est impossibile simpliciter. Unde non sequitur quod voluntas a Deo ex necessitate moveatur.” Of course, there is also Thomas’s teaching that the divine consequent will is the will of that which is consequent, since there is no antecedent or consequent in God. And thus, what is willed simply (which Thomas uses interchangeably with “consequently”) by God, is what is; and that which is willed antecedently is precisely something that in relation to something further is an antecedent. Of course, as Thomas teaches, the antecedent may be willed without God willing the consequent. But this is the very teaching which the accounts of Maritain and of Marín-Sola were authored to escape. See ST I, q. 19, a. 6, ad 1. 268 Steven A. Long Conclusion It is the divine will of an order containing creatures such as ourselves that are defectible (in our case, even with respect to their proximate good, while all creatures are defectible vis-à-vis the supernatural good) which is the root of the antecedent divine permission of actual defect. For such an order containing defectible creatures, some antecedent permission of actual defect is consistent with God moving things according to their defectible natures. In willing to create such creatures, God wills to move them according to their defectible natures, and so permits some measure of defect in and from themselves and/or others. This is a permission which may include a non-upholding in a special good which is not strictly owed to the creature by God, while yet each is given more aid than is due to all (for no mere creature simply of itself can, absolutely speaking, merit grace). In some cases this permission or non-upholding may include the permission of final impenitence. Thus, as Thomas says, insofar as God does not will the good of final perseverance to all, those for whom this good is not willed owing to the fitting permission of this defect—whose number we do not know—are said to be reprobated: a reprobation that takes nothing away from their power, freedom, or responsibility. Yet in this life God gives to all persons more help than is their due, as even the reprobate have received divine aid far exceeding their just desserts. Moreover, actual defect is not caused by God; it is permitted. The good of the entire order containing defectible creatures entails creatures being moved according to their natures, which are defectible. So, for God to create me in such an order is arguably for God to permit the incidence of defect in me40 that ultimately could include the permission of final impenitence: not because of a “hatred” for me,41 40 41 Such defect may embrace both “indispositions” of a natural sort that may bear on action and venial faults that lack the full nature of sin, as well of course as the acquired moral defects and indispositions of a lifetime; but also includes as well permission of genuine and full-blown moral defect. Most often (but not always) the latter has its predecedent source in the former: but not always. Hence unceasing prayer is everywhere admonished in the tradition. There is of course the line of St. Thomas in ST I, q. 23, a. 3, ad 1, that “Ad primum ergo dicendum quod Deus omnes homines diligit, et etiam omnes creaturas, inquantum omnibus vult aliquod bonum, non tamen quodcumque bonum vult omnibus. Inquantum igitur quibusdam non vult hoc bonum quod est vita aeterna, dicitur eos habere odio, vel reprobare.”— “To the first therefore it should be said that God loves all men and all creatures, inasmuch as He wishes them all some good; but He does not wish every good to them all. So far, therefore, as He does not wish this particular good—namely, eternal life—He is said to hate or reprobate them.” But Thomas writes “He is said.” That is, the ratio is stated God and the Permission of Evil 269 but because of what is due to the integrity of the order of creation and of the economy of grace. Frequently enough persons are upheld at the very moment when their prior defects would, absent further aid, lead to disaster, or converted through extraordinary graces from lifelong immersion in sin. But God does not owe this to any creature, and the abundance of such grace is a sign of the overflowing divine mercy and love whose full in the body of the article: “Unde, cum per divinam providentiam homines in vitam aeternam ordinentur, pertinet etiam ad divinam providentiam, ut permittat aliquos ab isto fine deficere. Et hoc dicitur reprobare.”— “Thus, as men are ordained to eternal life through the providence of God, it likewise is part of that providence to permit some to fall away from that end; this is called reprobation.” But why is it “part of that providence” to “permit some to fall away”? As God is infinitely good, the ratio is not a “hate” prior to creation (which would be identical with the divine essence and an absurdity). It is, rather, the love for the essential goodness of the order containing defectible creatures and of what is owed in justice to that order, which order is the precondition for there being creatures such as ourselves. What is due to the goodness of that order is due to the principle of that order, God himself. And so, when the permission of defect (the moving of defectible creatures according to their defectible natures which in this given order includes defect) in the defectible creature implies in some case what God cannot as the Cause of that order not know—the defect of final impenitence—God does not simply unravel the order as such. In permitting the impenitent creature to “fall away” he refuses to “unsay” what he has said, because the word of creation is good. A creation that is elevated in the divine love even amidst circumambient defectibility is preferred to an order with none of the implications of possible or real failure implied by and proportionate to such defectibility. And so “He is said” to hate or reprobate that creature who is permitted to “fall away,” because even in the giving of gratuitous aid, mercy, and love, the proportion of the good of the creation as a whole, and of the creature, is honored: the common good of the interlocking orders of creation and redemption is preferred to the good of any individual whatsoever and is not simply “set aside” (this is also in a different way the ratio in the penitent for the temporal penalty due to sin). The leaving of some in defect which they honor beyond God cannot remove the imperishable crown of the saints whose sins are goads to repentance, humility and penitence, for the sake of whom (proximately) the order exists. God is honored both in mercy and in justice, and the latter serves greatly to accentuate the former, and to vindicate the integrity of good even in the midst of wickedness. It is also medicinal in that it manifests the truth that only God can uphold the soul, and that worldly pleasures and powers are nothing by comparison with the divine friendship, and manifests this in such a manner that those “falling away” involuntarily serve the redemption of those who are upheld. Indeed, not all intelligent creatures start “even” at the same starting line: Mary is created as upheld from original sin by virtue of the inestimable privilege of the divine Maternity. To St. Joseph were confided the care and governance of the Blessed Mother and the Christ Child himself. The ultimate ratio is the divine Good himself in supernatural glory. 270 Steven A. Long extension we cannot apodictically know. Indeed, evil as such is permitted only as the condition for the overflowing of grace in the Incarnation of and Redemption wrought by the Eternal Word, who is predestined in passable flesh and with human faculties susceptible of suffering. The question may be asked whether an order containing creatures like ourselves, moved by God in the higher order of grace, is in principle evil or unjust to the degree that God does not necessarily specially uphold every creature to the infinitely transcendent supernatural beatitude beyond what is due to it and with no possibility or incidence of final defection. But the answer is: no. The least good or seeking of good in the creature is outdone by the infinite generosity of God. In the face of the neuralgic need to enjoy pre-emptive and certain knowledge of divine upholding in salvation, two speculative errors present themselves: either to insist that God must finally and certainly uphold all (apocatastasis); or to diminish the divine transcendence and simplicity, by virtue of which what God simply wills is, and by virtue of which every positive being and good, the determinate entitative reality of every operation (even sinful ones), has God as its first agent cause. It is this second path that was—obscurely—taken by Marín-Sola, the later Maritain, and many others. Maritain’s error here is particularly manifest, but it is the same as Marín-Sola’s: for Maritain, God can give a small motion to the creature, and then the creature’s “non-negation” determines whether there is further divine aid. But the same divine motion does not indifferently cause disparate effects; the causality of the creature lies within the divine first agency, and not without; and God either causes or does not. Non-negation in the really existing creature is something positive which is a gift efficaciously bestowed by God. It is conspicuous that the incisive and principled criticisms of Labourdette and Nicolas have yet to be sufficiently understood, much less answered: for every motion of the creature in nature and in grace requires divine premotion. To hold otherwise is to permit a deep insecurity regarding the divine goodness—the radiant cause of each and every good of whatsoever order—to cause one to surrender the intelligibility of the doctrine of God, and to abandon the divine simplicity and transcendence.42 Grace is “sufficient” only in relation to some further good, but is 42 Or, if the point is rejection of the need for premotion, one courts either occasionalism or the denial of Thomas’s teaching that the creature (which is not its own agency) must truly be moved by God in order to achieve the dignity of agency: that God is the first and principal cause of the application of every power to act. See Summa contra III, ch. 67 (“Sed omnis applicatio virtutis ad operationem est God and the Permission of Evil 271 always of itself “efficacious” with respect to some effect. In regard to that for which a grace is “sufficient” it is simply a proximate potency that awaits further divine aid. The creature cannot add to the effect of grace, since the creature’s own free act is comprised within the divine effect of grace itself.43 Nicolas himself even after being moved by an erroneous confusion of the ordinary falling from being and good with annihilation to disavow his earlier teaching, seems to have known that no other solution is possible. As Torre notes in his book, “Nicolas still remained unpersuaded by Maritain’s own account. He thus remained perplexed, believing that the right account had yet to be given properly.”44 Indeed. Were God’s causality not of itself efficacious, hope would be unreasonable. Because the actions of all creatures and the good of each voluntary act lie within the divine providence which is the first agent of every willing, we are right to place all confidence in God not in our own defectible natures: 43 44 principaliter et primo a Deo”—“But every application of power to operation is principally and first from God”). Thus, for example, ST I-II, q. 112, a. 2 resp., and especially a. 3, resp.: “Respondeo dicendum quod, sicut supra dictum est, praeparatio ad hominis gratiam est a Deo sicut a movente, a libero autem arbitrio sicut a moto. Potest igitur praeparatio dupliciter considerari. Uno quidem modo, secundum quod est a libero arbitrio. Et secundum hoc, nullam necessitatem habet ad gratiae consecutionem, quia donum gratiae excedit omnem praeparationem virtutis humanae. Alio modo potest considerari secundum quod est a Deo movente. Et tunc habet necessitatem ad id ad quod ordinatur a Deo, non quidem coactionis, sed infallibilitatis, quia intentio Dei deficere non potest; secundum quod et Augustinus dicit, in libro de Praedest. Sanct., quod per beneficia Dei certissime liberantur quicumque liberantur. Unde si ex intentione Dei moventis est quod homo cuius cor movet, gratiam consequatur, infallibiliter ipsam consequitur; secundum illud Ioan. VI, omnis qui audivit a patre et didicit, venit ad me.”—“As stated above, man’s preparation for grace is from God, as Mover, and from the free-will, as moved. Hence the preparation may be looked at in two ways: first, as it is from free-will, and thus there is no necessity that it should obtain grace, since the gift of grace exceeds every preparation of human power. But it may be considered, secondly, as it is from God the Mover, and thus it has a necessity—not indeed of coercion, but of infallibility—as regards what it is ordained to by God, since God’s intention cannot fail, according to the saying of Augustine in his book on the Predestination of the Saints that by God’s good gifts whoever is liberated, is most certainly liberated. Thus if God intends, while moving, that the one whose heart He moves should attain to grace, he will infallibly attain to it, according to John 6:45: ‘Every one that hath heard of the Father, and hath learned, cometh to Me.’” The divine simplicity and transcendence are powerfully asserted: the divine intention cannot fail. Torre, Do Not Resist, 245n83. in God who alone can uphold us in good or rectify us to it, and in the N&V promises of Christ.45 45 I have not in this essay addressed the position of Marín-Sola and of Torre that the distinction of the divided and composite senses of liberty is of rare application, but have done so elsewhere. Indeed, it applies everywhere, since we may always distinguish between the power of a thing in itself, and the power of a thing in relation to God. In the divided sense the will as a rational power is always capable of doing or not doing; but in the composite sense (in relation to the divine simple will) this is not true, because premotion is required for the self-motion of the creature. Thus, Mary retained the power to do otherwise (in the divided sense) when infallibly and efficaciously moved in grace freely to assent to the Incarnation. Her act is free by virtue of the nature of the rational power; but insofar as she is moved freely and rationally to assent, she is not not-moved (and so in the composite sense there is hypothetical necessity). Freedom of choice is not an exemption from the principle of non-contradiction. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 273–292 273 The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger’s Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation Santiago Sanz Pontifical University of the Holy Cross Rome, Italy Matthew J. Ramage 1 (translator) Benedictine College Atchison, KS Introduction It would be surprising for a pope to dedicate a homily for the Easter Vigil— the most important celebration of the liturgical year—to sketching the features of the Christian doctrine of creation, a topic that prima facie has minimal pastoral relevance. Yet Benedict XVI did precisely this on April 23, 2011, and again on April 8, 2012.2 Indeed, the now-emeritus Pontiff spoke frequently of the importance of faith in God the Creator and its consequences for the dialogue that Christians are called to undertake with the contemporary world,3 an approach that Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato Si’ has only confirmed. 1 2 3 For further discussion of Ratzinger's lecture notes within a broader treatment of his thought on creation and evolution, see Matthew J. Ramage, From the Dust of the Earth: Benedict XVI, the Bible, and the Theory of Evolution (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2022). Benedict XVI, Homily for the Easter Vigil, April 23, 2011, and Homily for the Easter Vigil, April 8, 2012. [Editorial note: All papal documents by Benedict can be found on the Vatican website.] See Benedict XVI, “Faith, Reason and the University: Memories and Reflections,” September 12, 2006 (also known as the Regensburg Address); Meeting with the Clergy of the Diocese of Bolzano-Bressanone, August 6, 2008; Speech to Members of the Roman Curia, December 22, 2008; apostolic exhortation Verbum Domini, September 30, 2010, §8; Speech at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, 274 Santiago Sanz In encountering Ratzinger’s theological thought, what immediately comes to mind is his strong grounding in Scripture and in the tradition of the Fathers and medieval masters (especially St. Augustine and St. Bonaventure)—as well as the importance he accords to the Church’s liturgical tradition (and thus his interest for ecclesiology and the sacraments, especially the Eucharist). If we add to this his early dedication to fundamental theology and his growing passion for Christology and eschatology,4 then it would appear that the doctrine of creation does not lie among the principal interests and theological contributions of our author. We could go further still—as some have done in the case of Introduction to Christianity, his most widespread and read work of theological synthesis— and decry the almost total absence of reference to the first article of faith in early Ratzingerian theology.5 Yet it is not accurate to say that the theme of creation is alien to Ratzinger’s thought. Indeed, a glance at the bibliography reveals that the interest was present already at the beginning of his scholarly corpus,6 although it is true that it appears to grow in importance over time. 4 5 6 May 3, 2012. The last general audience before his “great renunciation” treated precisely the topic “I believe in God: Maker of Heaven and Earth, the Creator of Man” (Benedict XVI, General Audience, February 6, 2013). On these general dimensions of Ratzinger’s theology, see A. Nichols, The Theology of Joseph Ratzinger: an Introductory Study (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1988); V. Twomey, Benedikt XVI. Das Gewissen unserer Zeit. Ein theologisches Portrait (Augsburg, 2006); P. Blanco, La teología de Joseph Ratzinger. Una introducción (Madrid: Palabra, 2011). See J. Auer, Die Welt—Gottes Schöpfung (Regensburg: Pustet, 1983), 23: “Als 1969 Joseph Ratzinger seine ‘Einführung in das Christentum’ veröffentlichte, kam in den großen Ausführungen über Gott ‘Gott der Schöpfer’ oder ‘die Welt als Schöpfung nicht zur Sprache, obwohl sich die Darlegungen an das Apostolicum hielten.’ Das entspricht dem Denken und Fragen der westlichen Welt von heute.” I myself have written something similar, expanding the criticism to K. Rahner’s widespread work Grundkurs des Glaubens as others had already done. See: S. Sanz, La relación entre creación y alianza en la teología contemporánea (Rome: EDUSC, 2003), 45; L. Scheffczyk, Schöpfung als Heilseröffnung. Schöpfungslehre (Aachen: MM Verlag, 1997), 34. In reality, a detailed study of the Ratzingerian corpus reveals a need to nuance such objections. See J. Rodríguez Mas, “La verdad de la creación en Introducción al cristianismo de J. Ratzinger,” in Fede e Ragione. Le luci della verità, ed. A. Porras (Rome: ESC, 2012), 213–24. Limiting ourselves to works and contributions exclusively on the theme of creation, let us note: “Schöpfung,” in Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed, J. Höfer and K. Rahner, vol. 9 (Herder: Freiburg, 1964), cols. 460–66; “Schöpfungsglaube und Evolutionstheorie,” in Wer ist das eigentlich—Gott?, ed. H. J. Schultz (München: Kosel, 1969), 232–45; Konsequenzen des Schöpfungsglaubens, Salzburger Universitätsreden 68 (Regensburg: Pustet, 1980); Im Anfang schuf The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 275 Aware of this evidence, there are those who have argued that Ratzinger changed his views over the years, first due to the post-conciliar situation, and then also to the continuing evolution of his ecclesial position (bishop, prefect, pope).7 I myself was convinced of this given that Ratzinger had grown in his appreciation for well-grounded moral theology and thereby to greater esteem for St. Thomas Aquinas even as he maintained his original Bonaventurian Augustinianism.8 Nevertheless, I began to rethink the notion that Ratzinger’s views had changed after my “chance” discovery of a 1964 Münster manuscript in a Toronto library, a text to which I have dedicated a large study in three stages.9 As I have shown in other studies, this need for change was further reinforced over the course of a sabbatical in Regensburg at the Institut Papst Benedikt XVI, where I came into contact with other manuscripts germane to Ratzinger’s doctrine of creation, one from 1958 and the other from 1976.10 These texts demonstrate that the doctrine of 7 8 9 10 Gott—Konsequenzen des Schöpfungsglaubens (Freiburg: Johannes, 1996), 77–94; Gottes Projekt. Nachdenken über Schöpfung und Kirche (Regensburg: Pustet, 2009). References to the importance of creation are present in many other works of Ratzinger. For a study and collection of texts, see J. Rodríguez Mas, “La relación, clave de lectura de la doctrina de la creación y del pecado original en la teología de Joseph Ratzinger,” (PhD diss., Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, 2013). H. Verweyen described the alleged about-face within Ratzinger’s theology as “the myth of the great change [der Mythos der großen Wende].”; see Verweyen, Joseph Ratzinger—Papst Benedikt XVI: Die Entwicklung seines Denkens, Primus Verlag (Darmstadt, 2007), 39–42. See also L. Boeve and G. Mannion, The Ratzinger Reader: Mapping a Theological Journey (London: T&T Clark, 2010), 11–12. See G. Pell, foreword to Tracy Rowland, Ratzinger’s Faith: Theology of Pope Benedict XVI (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), xii: “Ratzinger, like every main-line Catholic, is indebted to Aquinas in a thousand ways, especially in morality, and he is not hostile to classical Thomism in general or to St Thomas personally.” See also Blanco, La teología de Joseph Ratzinger, 23–31. An interesting fact is that, in the cycle of his catecheses on the Fathers of the Church and the great medieval doctors, Benedict XVI dedicated five audiences to the figure of Saint Augustine, while he dedicated “only” three to Saint Thomas and Saint Bonaventure. See S. Sanz, “Joseph Ratzinger y la doctrina de la creación: los apuntes de Münster,” Revista Española de Teología 74 (2014): 31–70; Sanz, “Joseph Ratzinger y la doctrina de la creación: los apuntes de Münster de 1964 (II): Algunos temas fundamentales,” Revista Española de Teología 74 (2014): 201–48; Sanz, “Joseph Ratzinger y la doctrina de la creación. los apuntes de Münster de 1964 (y III): Algunos temas debatidos,” Revista Española de Teología 74 (2014): 453–96. See S. Sanz, “La dottrina della creazione nelle lezioni del professor Joseph Ratzinger: gli appunti di Freising (1958),” Annales theologici 30 (2016): 11–44; 276 Santiago Sanz creation has been present in Ratzinger’s teaching through all the stages of his academic life.11 Given the importance of the topic, in this article I will present a summary of the results of my research into these manuscripts. First, however, we need to make some preliminary comments to contextualize the work and to explain what we stand to gain by studying the unpublished and therefore non-authoritative texts of an author like ours. Preliminary Considerations The Institut Papst Benedikt XVI houses many manuscripts of Ratzinger’s lecture notes (Vorlesungsmitschriften) beginning with the 1955–1956 academic year, all the way up to 1976. According to the list made available to me and dated March 5, 2015, seventy-one manuscripts have been cataloged.12 It must be borne in mind that some of these are duplicates or versions of the same course from different writers. For some, it is specified whether they have been taken by hand (handschriftlich) or are typewritten (maschinenschriftlich), while for others nothing of this kind is specified. Sometimes it gives information about the text’s provenance (i.e., the person who owns the notes), while other times it also includes the editor’s name. Of course, owner and editor do not necessarily coincide.13 11 12 13 Sanz, “La dottrina della creazione nelle lezioni del professor Joseph Ratzinger: gli appunti di Regensburg (1976),” Annales theologici 30 (2016): 251–83. I am grateful to the institute staff, especially its deputy director, Dr. Christian Schaller, for their welcome and help that made possible a profitable and serene development of my research. The work of W. Baier appears to further corroborate this statement [in editorial choices for] Weisheit Gottes—Weisheit der Welt: Festschrift für Joseph Kardinal Ratzinger zum 60. Geburtstag, vol. 2, ed, Baier (St. Ottilien: Eos, 1987). In this Festschrift for Ratzinger’s sixtieth birthday, one can grasp the importance that the theme of creation had for him. Of the almost 1400 pages comprising the two volumes, the first part of the five into which it is divided is entitled “Die Weisheit Gottes in der Schöpfung” (3–308) and consists of seventeen contributions on the doctrine of creation. There is another list available to researchers that contains up to ninety-seven titles, organized by the name of the person who wrote the notes. As we have said, however, some are mere duplicates or constitute different versions of the same course. Such is the case concerning a manuscript from the Freising period, which corresponds to the Trinitätslehre course of the winter semester 1957–1958. It contains 140 pages typewritten by Joh. Harrer and hailing from Jos. Mühlbacher, the same people who appear in the manuscript that we will be studying here. The notes of the course Der Gottesglaube der Kirche, held in the winter semester 1972–1973, span seventy-six typewritten pages and were composed by Markus The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 277 We do not have a lot of data when it comes to the method that Ratzinger’s students used to compose these notes. According to an expert of the institute, the lectures were recorded on cassettes beginning in the 1960s, but once transcribed the tapes were recycled for other courses. Because of this, unfortunately, the audio of these recorded lectures has not been preserved.14 The manuscripts span the whole gamut of Ratzinger’s academic life and come from lectures held at the various institutions where he taught: the Freising seminary and the theological faculties of Bonn, Münster, Tübingen, and Regensburg. They bear witness to the diversity of dogmatic disciplines Ratzinger taught. Among those preserved are notes for fundamental theology, Trinitarian theology, Christology, sacraments (especially Eucharist), ecclesiology, eschatology, and still others.15 Ten of the seventy-one manuscripts on the list deal with the doctrine of creation and represent three of the five times that Ratzinger taught this treatise based on the available information.16 Specifically, there are five copies of the course held in Freising in the summer semester of 1958, four of the course held in Münster in the summer semester of 1964, and 14 15 16 Franz (Skribent), whereas they come from the archive of Gregor Tischler (from Regensburg). See the author’s personal interviews with Franz-Xaver Heibl from July 6–17, 2015. For a complete list of the courses taught by our professor over his academic career, see V. Pfnür, Joseph Ratzinger, Papst Benedikt XVI, Das Werk: bibliographisches Hilfsmittel zur Erschliessung des literarisch-theologischen Werkes von Joseph Ratzinger bis zur Papstwahl (Augsburg: Sankt Ulrich, 2009), 401–6; see also G. Valente, Ratzinger professore. Gli anni dello studio e dell’ insegnamento nel ricordo dei colleghi e degli allievi (1946–1977) (San Paolo: Cinisello Balsamo, 2008), 189–96. In relation to the lists present in the works indicated in the previous note, there are no notes for the 1955 course on creation delivered in Freising or the one held in Regensburg in 1970. Of the five copies of the 1958 Freising course, three are handwritten (at least one certainly by Joseph Vogt) with various additions, and two are typewritten. The three copies of the 1964 Münster course are typewritten, without any indication of their editor. There is another typewritten copy that does not specify its year or place, yet a glance at the table of contents and the content itself is sufficient to understand that it aligns entirely with the 1964 course. Regensburg from 1976 is machine driven. The other list of which we have spoken, classified according to the name of its editors, mentions: four copies of the 1958 course by Joseph Vogt; three other copies of the same course (one lacking an indication of its editor, and two made available to us by Joh. Harrer and Jos. Mühlbacher); and, finally, a copy of the Münster manuscript that we have already treated. 278 Santiago Sanz one from that held in Regensburg from the summer semester of 1976. The typed versions of these courses have lengths of 101, 254, and 128 pages, respectively.17 The Münster manuscript of 1964 is one of the most carefully edited in terms of presentation, in addition to being one of the longest overall. The other two also have features that make them interesting, and thus a brief description of their content will be useful. At this point, however, we need to ask ourselves what is to be gained by a study of this sort. The first thing to observe is that, as indicated to me both by the institute staff and by the personal secretary of Benedict XVI himself, these are not authorized writings, and therefore cannot be considered official works of the author stricto sensu.18 Indeed, we have no guarantee that the author continues to support a particular opinion that he may have expressed in his lectures as documented in these unpublished texts. In addition to this limit, or rather more fundamentally, one may contest the veracity or reliability of the notes. This logically depends on the competence of the student who writes them. The fact that Joseph Ratzinger never once authorized their publication is undoubtedly significant.19 Nevertheless, there are good reasons to offer a description of these notes to the theological community. In the first place, they are sources of Ratzinger’s thought. One cannot reasonably doubt that their contents substantially correspond to what he said in his lectures, and that they therefore reflect his thinking and opinions at that time regardless of whether they went on to be published or not.20 In this regard, as I have 17 18 19 20 One of the copies of the 1964 course, the one without indication of place or date, has a smaller page count (182 compared to 254 in the other versions) simply because there is more text on each page, as can be easily verified from a comparative reading of the manuscripts. Author’s personal interview with His Excellency the Most Reverend Msgr. Georg Gänswein, Vatican City, February 26, 2015. I am grateful to Msgr. Gänswein for the valuable suggestions and information he provided me. “Man sollte bei allen Manuskripten, die von Joseph Ratzingers Vorlesungen angefertigt worden sind, bedenken, dass es sich um Mitschriften von seinen Studenten handelt. Er selbst hat nie ein Manuskript ausgeteilt oder autorisiert, bis auf eine Aufnahme” (private letter from Dr. Christian Schaller to the author, August 7, 2014). According to Msgr. Gänswein, it was normal in that era within German theological faculties for students to copy the professor’s lecture notes and then arrange them in order with a table of contents, bibliographies, and the like. The professor never allowed such notes to be published as his own, as that would have been tantamount to accepting that the mere study of those notes would be sufficient for students to master the material. However, he did acknowledge that his name was present, that he had in some way authorized the notes’ existence, and that The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 279 shown in my study of the Münster manuscript, some of Ratzinger’s later publications had a clear basis in these lecture notes, at times lifting from them entire paragraphs verbatim.21 This applies not only to the doctrine of creation but also could easily be shown with regard, for example, to eschatology, the only subject for which he has published a manual.22 More generally, we must not forget that lecture notes are an important source (in some cases the only one) for learning about the thought of great authors like Aristotle, Duns Scotus, Francisco de Vitoria, and Hegel, to name just a few.23 The fact that the Institut Papst Benedikt XVI preserves these manuscripts and makes them available to scholars is itself indicative of their non-negligible value, as they are lecture notes of a professor who over time became not only an internationally renowned theologian but also successor of Peter and, as of February 28, 2013, the first pope emeritus in modern times. 21 22 23 they served as a study guide. From this, we can infer that Ratzinger approved these texts as corresponding with what he taught in class. This is not to say that what we read reflects his final opinion on every single issue treated. What certainly can be said is that Ratzinger said those things in class (see interview with His Excellency the Most Reverend Msgr. Gänswein). See the second and third parts of the study cited in note 8, which contain numerous quotations from texts in Ratzinger’s publications parallel to those in the Münster manuscript. On this score, Msgr. Gänswein acknowledged that, if we should happen to find texts of later publications that are similar or even identical to what we have in these manuscripts, then such student Mitschriften enjoy a high degree of reliability and in some sense truly can be considered Ratzinger’s thought. In any case, the secretary of the emeritus Pontiff observed that Ratzinger had expressed his vision on creation in the publications we have listed in note 5. J. Ratzinger, Eschatologie. Tod und ewiges Leben (Regensburg: Püstet, 1978). In the list of manuscripts present at the institute, we find notes for Ratzinger’s eschatology courses in the winter semester of the academic year 1957–1958 (three handwritten copies of brief and variable lengths), handwritten ones for the summer semester of 1968, typewritten ones for the summer semester of 1972, and typewritten ones for the summer semester of 1975. This last copy of 124 pages in length is the most extensive and perfect in comparison with the others. If you compare this copy with the manual published a few years later, you will notice a great overlap both in the table of contents and in the content itself, with many identical paragraphs, although naturally the manual contains not only modifications but also amplifications. It is interesting to note that Karl Rahner’s courses from 1956–1959 on the doctrine of creation and grace can be found on his archive’s website. [Editorial note: This was the case up through when Fr. Sanz last consulted the site on November 22, 2018, but the link used at that time has since ceased to reach the site.] A comparative study with the manuscripts of our professor would be interesting, but this task lies beyond our competence. 280 Santiago Sanz The Freising Manuscript (1958) In the 1958–1959 academic year, Ratzinger held the chair of dogmatic and fundamental theology at the college of philosophical and theological studies in Freising, before moving to Bonn. Actually, he had begun teaching there already in the academic year 1954–1955.24 At this time, among others, he twice gave a course of four lecture hours per week on the doctrine of creation, one in the summer semester of 1955 and the other in the summer semester of 1958.25 We are in possession of a typed manuscript of 108 pages [total] of this last instance. The manuscript is entitled Schöpfungslehre, with the name of the professor and the semester further specified (“Nach einer Vorlesung von Prof. Jos. Ratzinger, im SS 1958”). Additionally, the cover indicates the editor’s name (“Skriptum geschrieben von Joh. Herrer”), and below it the presumed owner of this copy (Jos. Mülbacher). The table of contents (Inhaltsverzeichnis) follows in seven pages with Roman numerals, and then the 101 pages of content. At the end of the last page, we find the date of the lectures’ conclusion: July 25, 1958 (“Ende 25.7.1958”). The first surprising thing is the breadth of the table of contents. For just over a hundred pages, it is quite rich in titles and subtitles, especially if we compare it with the other two manuscripts’ table of contents. This may be indicative of a minor expansion in explanation of the themes, greater concision on the part of the editor, or likely both. The general structure is at bottom quite simple. The text is divided into two major parts. The first somewhat resembles the traditional distinction of the De Deo creante treatise between creation active sumpta (i.e., the creative act of God) and creation passive sumpta (i.e., created being).26 Each of these, in turn, is divided into two parts: first the dimension of static nature, and then the dimension of historical dynamism. Thus, the first part deals with creative divine action and then with providence, while the second covers Christian doctrine on man as creature and then the specification of his historic-salvific condition as sinner.27 24 25 26 27 See J. Ratzinger, Milestones: Memoirs 1927–1977 (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1998), 41. See Pfnür, Das Werk, 401. The distinction comes from Thomas Aquinas. See, for example, De potentia, q. 3, a. 3, corp. See J. Ratzinger, Schöpfungslehre, Nachschrift der Vorlesung im SS 1958 (Freising, 1958), 2: “Die Schöpfungslehre teilt man am besten in 2 Hauptabschnitte ein: 1. die Schöpfungstat Gottes und 2. das Schöpfungswerk Gottes, die Geschöpfe im einzelnen.” Hereafter, we will cite this document with the abbreviation SS 1958. Accordingly, we will quote the Münster manuscript as SS 1964 The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 281 Within this schema, two elements of particular interest stand out. The first is that the supernatural elevation of man, and accordingly the great nature–grace theme is dealt with in the first part at the end, rather than at the beginning of the second, as will be the case in 1964.28 The other is that here a specific section is dedicated to angels and demons; most likely due to lack of time, however, the pages dedicated to this topic are few and the style of the notes is particularly succinct and schematic. We will see later that this theme disappears from the table of contents in the 1964 manuscript and then reappears emphatically in that of 1976. Turning to the formal aspects of development within the course content, the first thing that draws our attention is that here it is very clear that these are notes written by a student. Indeed, they contain many short paragraphs with definitions and precise explanations of various concepts. The manuscripts of 1964 and 1976 are also the work of students, yet comparatively they have a more refined style. One point that illustrates this difference is that here, in the 1958 manuscript, Ratzinger’s name is spelled out on several occasions in order to clarify that the professor’s opinion on the topic in question is being transcribed.29 28 29 and that of Regensburg as SS 1976. The tables of contents in the appendices of our previous studies can be compared. See Sanz, “Joseph Ratzinger y la doctrina de la creación,” 58–63; “La dottrina della creazione (Freising),” 34–39; “La dottrina della creazione (Regensburg),” 278–79. Following a traditional schema, within the first part on the creative act Ratzinger includes a final chapter (“3. Kapitel: Die übernatürliche Erhebung der Kreatur” [SS 1958, 40–53]) which acts as a bridge to the second part on creatures. God creates but also elevates; supernatural elevation is also God’s action, which recalls the old name of the treatise: De Deo creante et elevante. In 1964, on the other hand, this theme will be dealt with in the part on man as one of the pairs of fundamental concepts for understanding human beings: nature and grace: see Sanz, “Joseph Ratzinger y la doctrina de la creación,” 41; “Joseph Ratzinger y la doctrina de la creación [III],” 459–71. On the possibility of an eternal world in Thomas, who himself had inherited a certain Aristotelian conception in this regard (and without saying anything in relation to Bonaventure or other medieval doctors), Ratzinger only notes the following: “Nach Ratzinger hat Thomas recht. Die Möglichkeit einer Anfangslosen Schöpfung scheint möglich zu sein” (SS 1958, 19). In touching the subject of man as the center of creation, we observe: “Ratzinger: Im Hinblick auf die Erde trifft die Feststellung zu. Die Erde ist um des Menschen willen da (Gen 1)” (SS 1958, 23). With regard to some authors who favor a symbolic interpretation of the story of Eve’s creation, we read: “Nach Ratzinger sind diese Theologen auf dem richtigen Weg” (SS 1958, 60). On various exegetical opinions on the image of God in man, we read: “Ratzinger: Diese Argumentation ist nicht völlig unberechtigt” (SS 1958, 66); and concretely, regarding the idea that the 282 Santiago Sanz At the same time, it must be acknowledged that the 1958 manuscript served as the basis for the one from 1964. This is evident not only due to parallelism between the tables of contents already described, but moreover because we often find paragraphs within the two that are practically identical or at least exhibit strong similarity. Indeed, we observe continuity between the two manuscripts in content and in style, whereas we shall see that the manuscript of 1976 will in some ways represent a further degree of maturation. Although there is no place for footnotes in this Freising manuscript, we do have numerous bibliographies, typically provided at the end of sections. Citations of texts from Sacred Scripture and the magisterium are also abundant, with frequent reporting of the degree of assent required for the various theses expounded (de fide; sententia certa; sententia communis; etc.) followed by corresponding references to Denzinger. In this sense, one could say that these notes of 1958 contain several elements that resemble the neo-Scholastic manuals of the time. It is no coincidence that on several occasions explicit reference is made to one of the most widespread dogmatic treatises of the time, the Diekamp.30 In my estimation, some characteristic traits of these lectures include the use of metaphysical categories (causality, participation, relationship) to articulate the relationship between the natural dimensions of the created order and those of the supernatural revealed in salvation history, a 30 complementarity between men and women is part of this image: “Ratzinger: Dies stellt so eine exegetische Naivität dar. In dieser Form stimmt es nicht” (SS 1958, 67). Finally, in addressing the soul–body relationship and the Thomistic position on the one substantial form, we read: “Die thomistische These von der Einzigkeit der Form muh auf jeden Fall ausscheiden. Die eigentliche Lösung sieht Ratzinger darin, daß man nicht mit einer Formel arbeitet, sondern mit 2 Formeln: 1. anima = corporis forma; 2. corpus = quoddammodo forma animae” (SS 1958, 76). See F. Diekamp, Katholische Dogmatik nach den Grundsätzen des heiligen Thomas (Münster: Aschendorff, 1949–1954). For example, speaking of the glory of God, Ratzinger echoes the distinction between gloria Dei interna and gloria Dei externa, and, within this, between gloria Dei externa objectiva and gloria Dei externa formalis (see SS 1958, 21). Dealing with Providence with explicit reference to Diekamp, he makes a distinction between providence in a broad sense and the divine government of the world and, within this, between the conservation of things in being and concursus divinus (see SS 1958, 33). When it comes to the question of the supernatural, he likewise follows the complex Scholastic division of this category: substantial and accidental; and, within this, secundum quid and simpliciter, which in its own turn is divided into quoad modum and quoad substantiam (see SS 1958, 41). The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 283 Franciscan-style optimism in creation, and a lucid vision of the human sin’s origin and transmission.31 The Münster Manuscript (1964) Gianni Valente informs us that the move from Bonn to Münster in 1962 was positive for the young Professor Ratzinger.32 Whereas in Bonn some colleagues did not welcome the fact that a young theologian had been appointed peritus in the work of the Second Vatican Council, in Münster he found a cordial and stimulating atmosphere among both the professors and the students. At this time, his fame visibly began to spread. With the large number of students attending his lectures, one of his disciples, V. Pfnür, sold 850 copies of the typewritten notes of Ratzinger’s course on the Eucharist. He then decided to expand the experience by creating “a small printing house. When the lectures were mimeographed, entire courses were circulated all over Germany. All the theological faculties sought these out from us. It was a sign that the number of Ratzinger’s admirers was increasing everywhere.”33 This description helps to explain the origin of the manuscript that I discovered for the first time in the library of the University of Saint Michael’s College in Toronto and which I subsequently found in the Institut Benedikt XVI. This is the course on the doctrine of creation held in the summer semester of 1964, as explained on the cover (“Joseph Ratzinger / Schöpfungslehre”),34 which also includes a short paragraph at the bottom 31 32 33 34 I have dwelt upon these points in Sanz, “La dottrina della creazione (Freising),” 18–31. Valente, Ratzinger professore, 93ff. For more information on this period of our author’s life, see M. Schlögl, Joseph Ratzinger in Münster (Münster: Dialogverlag, 2012). Valente, Ratzinger professore, 117–18. Here we read that on average six hundred listeners attended the lectures, and that the students of other faculties such as philosophy and jurisprudence also came to hear Ratzinger. On the relationship between Pfnür and Ratzinger in this period, see Schlögl, Joseph Ratzinger in Münster, 45–46. See SS 1964, cover: “Dieses Skriptum erscheint als Nachschrift einer Vorlesung, die Prof. Joseph Ratzinger im Sommersemester 1964 an der theol. Fakultät der Universität Münster gehalten hat.” Among the unpublished sources (Ungedruckte Quellen) in the bibliography at the end of the book on Ratzinger in Münster, in a subsection that lists the lecture notes of our author (“Mitschriften der Vorlesungen und Vorträge von Joseph Ratzinger”) we find mention of these notes along with the precise page count: “Schöpfungslehre (SS 1964, 254 S.).” See Schlögl, Joseph Ratzinger in Münster, 171. 284 Santiago Sanz in which the editor takes responsibility for any possible errors.35 Six pages (in Roman numerals) of the table of contents immediately follow, and then the 254 pages of exposition on various topics. The table of contents (Inhalt) provides detailed information, with precise divisions into parts, chapters, paragraphs, and the like, as we have already seen in the case of the 1958 manuscript; and, once again, the first page of each section is indicated. The general structure is divided into two major parts, following the classical schema (first creative divine action, and then created being) yet with a nuance that is not without importance: in the second part, the human being is approached as the central created being.36 In contrast with the other manuscripts, in vain do we seek here a chapter or section dedicated explicitly to the angelic domain, although this does not mean that it is absent in the course of the reflections. The study of creatio active sumpta unfolds in two phases: the divine creative act is not reduced to an initial moment, but instead is prolonged in the divine government of the world (conservation and providence). Accordingly, two main chapters comprise this first part. The first aligns with the theological and exegetical developments of the time (exegete Gerhard von Rad’s vision of salvation history and Karl Barth’s work on the relationship between creation and covenant).37 Ratzinger does not limit his consideration of the biblical notion of creation to Genesis, but rather opens it to the whole history of salvation—and thereby to a Christological reading. Along with the biblical grounding of his treatments, dialogue with other areas of human wisdom, especially philosophy, is integral to the Ratzingerian style. In this way, the chapter concludes with a reflection on the philosophical consequences of faith in creation. The central thesis is that Christianity replaces a matter–spirit dualism with the duality of Creator–creature. The second chapter, much shorter, focuses on the concepts of conservation and 35 36 37 See SS 1964, cover: “Es trägt rein privaten Charakter und erhebt nicht den Anspruch, die Ansichten von Professor Ratzinger immer richtig wiedergegeben zu haben. Alle Mängel und Fehler in der Wiedergabe seines Vortrages gehen zu Lasten der Redaktion. Das Skriptum ist ausschließlich für Hörer der Vorlesung bestimmt.” See SS 1964, 5: “Aus praktischen Gründen ist es vorteilhafter, bei der üblichen Einteilung zu bleiben, so daß wir in einem ersten Teil die Schöpfungstat Gottes (Woher die Welt?), In einem zweiten das Schöpfungswerk (Was ist der Mensch?) Besprechen warden.”. On this issue, see S. Sanz, “Creation and Covenant in Contemporary Theology: A Synthesis of the Principal Interpretative Keys,” Nova et Vetera (English) 12, no. 1 (2014): 217–53. The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 285 providence. Ever taking salvation history as its interpretative key, it offers a dynamic view of creation understood as creatio continua, itself implying a conception of created being as intrinsically temporal. The second part on man in creation is also divided into two major chapters. The first and longer one sets out to sketch the characteristic features of human nature according to God’s creative design. The second, meanwhile, deals with the historical development of human nature, including the first free decision that transformed the human being into a sinner before God. Taking as its starting point the biblical witness of man’s creation in the image and likeness of God, Ratzinger structures the Christian understanding of man in three pairs of concepts (nature and grace; soul and body; creation and evolution) and dedicates the ensuing sections to these. The large section dedicated to the problem of “creation and evolution” (thirty pages) reveals the liveliness of discussions on the topic in those years. Aware of the difficulties involved with a theological exposition of paradise and of original sin in the contemporary world, Ratzinger begins the last chapter with the traditional doctrine of the Church as a basis for confronting the challenges of modern thought. This leads him back to the biblical witness, striving to situate Genesis 3 within the whole of Scripture, especially the New Testament. In this way, he avoids a reductive reading of the Church’s faith. A fundamental question present in our young theologian from the time of his research on Saint Bonaventure’s theology of history is the relationship between the fields of metaphysics and salvation history.38 To my mind, a glance at the outline of the doctrine of creation sketched here suggests that Ratzinger wished to see both perspectives in a harmonious relationship, avoiding the then-common temptation to set them in opposition to one another. The two main parts deal, respectively, with God the Creator and the creature man. Each part is in its own turn divided into two. The first begins with the creative act and then discusses its prolongation in history. In an analogous way, the second part deals first with man as a creature of God, and from there considers his historical condition as a sinner. It seems obvious to me that in this schema primacy belongs to God. 38 See J. Ratzinger, Die Geschichtstheologie des heiligen Bonaventura (München: Schnell & Steiner, 1959). As is known, this publication contains only part of the manuscript. The work in its totality saw the light of day just a few years ago as a key part of the second volume of the Opera Omnia: J. Ratzinger, Gesammelte Schriften, vol. 2, Offenbarungsverständnis und Geschichtstheologie Bonaventuras. Habilitationsschrift und Bonaventura-Studien (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 2009). 286 Santiago Sanz Moreover, there is the desire to distinguish without separating what is natural from what is historical, what comes from God from what proceeds from the play of created freedom within history—in the relationship of that freedom with the fundamental freedom of the Creator who continues to act in that same story. In contrast with the other two manuscripts, the one from Münster has footnotes with citations and bibliographical references. That said, what is common to all is that each offers a short bibliography (Literatur) at the beginning of almost all sections as well as supplementary notes. This demonstrates the up-to-date nature (as of that time, naturally) of the books and articles cited. Most are publications from the late 1950s and early 1960s. In other words, here we are looking at what was the most up-to-date literature of the time, with a commanding but not exclusive presence of German-language publications, including the most widespread theological and biblical encyclopedias and dictionaries. Ratzinger’s characteristic freedom of thought is evident in his manner of engaging in dialogue with those who support differing theological or philosophical positions. We have an example of this in his colleague Karl Rahner, clearly the most cited contemporary author in these pages. Here we readily observe the influence of the anthropological turn along with criticisms of some of its claims.39 Ratzinger also cites authors such as Martin Heidegger, who in his work Sein und Zeit develops a dynamic conception of being in history,40 and the Jesuit Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, with his evolutionary vision of created being as temporal.41 Ratzinger welcomes insights from Jewish thinkers such as Martin Buber and Franz 39 40 41 After having referenced a text by Rahner on the connection between creation and incarnation, Ratzinger shows himself partially in agreement while adding: “Es wäre da noch manches zu bedenken” (SS 1964, 122). Regarding the well-known Rahnerian notion of a supernatural existential in man, Ratzinger references Balthasar’s opinion that this notion appears to attempt a reconciliation of the irreconcilable. “Dieses übernatürliche Existential ist selbst schon übernatürlich, wenngleich Existential, und ist folglich, weil übernatürlich, prinzipiell in abstracto noch von der Natur als reiner Natur trennbar. Rahner versucht unversöhnlich Scheinende das zu verbinden...Balthasar glaubt, daß Rahners Versuch ist doch nur eine Scheinversöhnung” (SS 1964, 143). See SS 1964, 82: “Also eine ganz neue Konzeption von Kosmos und Wirklichkeit. Sein und Zeit treten in eine untrennbare Relation; ‘Sein und Zeit,’ dies Titel von Heideggers erstem Werk, drückt einen Grundgedanken des modernen Denkens aus. Zeitlichkeit erscheint nun als die wesentliche Verfaßtheit des Seins selbst.” See SS 1964, 173: “Teilhard: ‘Die Evolution ist nicht schöpferisch, wie die Wissenschaft einen Augenblick glauben konnte, sondern vielmehr der Ausdruck für unsere Erfahrung der Schöpfung in Raum und Zeit’” (see also 175, 197). The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 287 Rosenzweig, in particular the “dialogical principle” (das dialogische Prinzip) of the former.42 At the same time, he has no problem referencing an author like Matthias Joseph Scheeben, widely considered the classic authority on the subject of the supernatural.43 He even discusses so-called “baroque” or “Jesuit” theology—itself the object of strong criticism in those years—acknowledging at once both its limitations and correct motivations.44 In this, Ratzinger’s judgment appears better thought out than that of authors such as Henri de Lubac and even Hans Urs von Balthasar, who nevertheless exerted an important influence on Ratzinger. In my opinion, something Ratzinger says en passant regarding the value of the Platonic and Aristotelian cosmic vision can be considered an interesting hermeneutical principle: “Naturally, let us not delude ourselves: every image of the world has its dark and clear sides. Consequently, not everything that is new is by that very fact good! On the other hand, though, we should see and openly understand that this new image of the world that has come to us offers real possibilities for faith.”45 The Regensburg Manuscript (1976) After teaching for a few years in Bonn (1959–1963) and Münster (1963– 1966), in 1966 Ratzinger found the opportunity to draw nearer to his 42 43 44 45 See SS 1964, 114: “In dieser Idee der Brüderlichkeit, die wir als konstitutiv für das biblische Menschenbild ansprechen konnten, ist zugleich jener Gedanke miteingeschlossen, der in unserem Jh. die Anthropologie revolutioniert hat: das dialogische Prinzip (M. Buber, Ferd. Ebner, Fr. Rosenzweig)” (SS 1964, 114). For the influence upon Ratzinger’s thought by Buber and Ebner, as well as other figures like Guardini, de Lubac, and Balthasar, see A. Läpple, Benedikt XVI. und seine Wurzeln (Augsburg: Sankt Ulrich, 2006). See SS 1964, 122: “Mehr als sonstwo ist Scheeben in dieses Thema der klassische Autor.” See SS 1964, 127“Wenn man das unter solchen Aspekten ausgesprochen geistesgeschichtlich Bedingte der Jesuiten-Dogmatik und des Barock sieht, dann wird man sich doch auch nicht vergeben dürfen, daß auch immer noch darin theol. Motive am Werke waren.” See also SS 1964, 137: “Trotzdem kann man diesen Versuch nicht einfach übergehen. Es steckt nämlich in ihm auch etwas theol. sehr Großes: die strikte Wahrung der absoluten Freiheit der Gnade, ihre Ungeschuldetheit. Das bleibt für immer das Positive dieses Versuches.” See SS 1964, 184: “Selbstverständlich geben wir uns keiner Täuschung hin, daß jedes Weltbild seine blinden und seine hellen Seiten hat. Nicht alles, was neu ist, ist deswegen schon gut! Aber umgekehrt sollten wir sehen und offen wahrnehmen, daß dieses neue auf uns zukommende Weltbild wahrhafte auch Chancen für den Glauben anbietet. Aufgabe der Theologie ist es, jene Gegebenheiten, die in der platonisch-aristotelischen Grundkonzeption nicht zum Zug gekommen sind, aufzugreifen und dabei die eigene Tradition als Korrektiv zu Hilfe zu nehmen.” 288 Santiago Sanz Bavarian birthplace when he accepted the chair of dogmatics at the prestigious University of Tübingen.46 There, however, the post-conciliar climate prior to the events of May 1968 did not favor the serene approach to theological work that is characteristic of our professor. Soon afterward, the year 1967 saw the creation of a chair of dogmatics in the theology faculty of the newly founded University of Regensburg. This presented Ratzinger with the occasion to return to his native land, although he did not immediately seize it, given that he had only recently arrived in Tübingen. By 1969, the situation in Tübingen had significantly deteriorated and showed no signs of improvement. In Regensburg, meanwhile, a second chair had been created. Given this opportunity, Ratzinger decided to accept the offer to return to his beloved Bavaria, which also made it possible for him and his two brothers to live together.47 The Regensburg years (1969–1977) are those of our author’s full theological maturity. As he writes in his autobiography, “the feeling of acquiring a theological vision that was ever more clearly my own was the most wonderful experience of the Regensburg years.”48 In these years, our professor taught many dogmatic treaties. His repeated and mature teaching of Christian eschatology eventually resulted in the publication of the only book penned by Ratzinger in the project Kleine katholische Dogmatik by his colleague Johann Auer.49 Regarding the treatise on creation, which had been absent in his teaching at Tübingen, we know that he taught it twice in the Regensburg period: once in the summer semester of 1970 (one hour per week of lectures) and again in the summer semester of 1976 (two hours per week).50 The typewritten notes of this last instance have been preserved, and we can say that these are the “penultimate” university lectures of the man who only a few months later would be appointed Archbishop of Munich and Freising. The cover opens by indicating the university and faculty (“Universität Regensburg / Fachbereich Kath. Theologie”), followed by the subject and the professor (“Dogmatik // Prof. Dr. Joseph Ratzinger // Algemeine Schöpfungslehre”). After this, the date and the name of the notes’ editor are mentioned (“SS 1976 // Erwin Keller”), followed by a notice 46 47 48 49 50 See Ratzinger, Milestones, 132. See Ratzinger, Milestones, 140. Ratzinger, Milestones, 150. More details on both periods of Ratzinger’s life (Tübingen and Regensburg) can be found in P. Blanco, Benedicto XVI: El papa alemán (Barcelona: Planeta, 2010), 191–230; see also Valente, Ratzinger Professore, 120–47 and 148–79. On the vicissitudes of this project, see Ratzinger, Milestones, 150. See Pfnür, Das Werk, 401–6; see also Valente, Ratzinger professore, 189–96. The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 289 regarding the limits of the writing analogous to what we found in the Münster manuscript.51 Here we also find a table of contents (Gliederung) of two pages in Roman numerals, followed by the treatment of topics over the course of 128 pages. As in the other manuscripts, in-depth bibliographies for further reading are provided.52 The fact that two pages are sufficient to summarize all the content reveals a difference with respect to the manuscripts of 1958 and 1964 in that the structure has been notably simplified. The professor no longer feels bound by a complete and pre-established program for his subject, but instead gives the impression of wanting to concentrate his efforts on themes that he considers particularly important at the time of his teaching. The first page of contents offers a simple listing of the four chapters that he wishes to develop: (1) structure and form of Christian faith in creation; (2) Creator invisibilium (angelology); (3) being and becoming; 4) meaning and ethos of creation. The chapters are preceded by a preliminary reflection on the meaning of the doctrine of creation.53 Ratzinger therefore feels the need to insist on some questions that required clarification in the ‘70s. First of all, the fact that he dedicated a large section to the question of angels and the devil in the mid-1970s is to my mind deeply suggestive.54 Moreover, the very notion of creation needed 51 52 53 54 “Dieses Skriptum ist eine persönliche Mitschrift; es ist nicht wörtlich; es erhebt keinen Anspruch auf Fehlerlosigkeit und es will auch nicht die Vorlesung ersetzen” (J. Ratzinger, Allgemeine Schöpfungslehre, Nachschrift der Vorlesung im SS 1976, Regensburg). Indeed, the pages containing these lists are mentioned at the end of page II of the table of contents. A glance is sufficient to confirm a fact that should not be surprising but which is nice to note: Ratzinger’s ability to incorporate new materials from more recent publications into his explanations. See SS 1976, 1: “Vorüberlegungen; 1. Kap.: Struktur und Gehalt des christlichen Schöpfungsglaubens; 2. Kap.: Creator invisibilium (Angelologie); 3. Kap.: Sein und Werden; 4. Kap.: Schöpfungssinn und Schöpfungsethos.” This enumeration is followed by two clarifications (Nota bene) that promise to offer later what in fact has already been made available in the two pages of the table of contents (a detailed table of contents and bibliographies). For this reason, we think that the table of contents was the last thing to be included in the manuscript. At this point, and almost anecdotally, we may note that the entire explanation of section 7 (“Freiheit–Gnade–Schicksal”) and part of section 8 (point 2: “Vertiefung des christl. Schöpfungsglauben”; and 3: “Neuzeitliche Erscheinungen”) was unfortunately omitted due to want of time. However, the professor does at least offer students a bibliography for personal study. As we know, in those years of the anthropological turn within theology, the passage from the treatise on God the Creator to nascent theological anthropology 290 Santiago Sanz a rethinking due to the apparent lessening of its significance within theology in connection with the worldview emerging from the experimental sciences.55 With this in mind, one can perhaps better understand the reason for the long dialogue that takes place at this juncture with the theses of an author such as Jacques Monod. On the other hand, we can also discern here a greater maturity within our author, in particular in his epistemological understanding of the biblical accounts, enriched as it was by new features. As can be gathered from the bibliographies, Ratzinger knows how to keep up to date by clarifying, and if necessary modifying, his own opinions when biblical exegesis offers new data. This applies above all to the question of the origin of biblical faith in creation, as can be seen in his contrasting of [Claus] Westermann’s theses to those of von Rad.56 That there is a more mature thought here than we find in the other two manuscripts is also evident in the fact that the relationship of these notes with published materials, both before and after the lectures, is more extensive and direct.57 Thus, some parts of the first chapter, already present in previous manuscripts, certainly form the basis of his Lenten sermons in Munich preached a few years later, which in their own turn gave rise to the book In the Beginning: A Catholic Understanding of Creation and the 55 56 57 more than once led to the disappearance of the chapter on angels from the manuals. It seems that Ratzinger himself was influenced by this milieu if we compare the 1958 manuscript with that of 1964. As we have already said, the first retained the chapter on angels and demons, while in the second it disappears. Over the years, however, the theme of angels had returned both in authors who opted to dedicate a specific treatise to the theology of creation as well as in others who included it in theological anthropology. Among the first, see L. Scheffczyk, Schöpfung als Heilseröffnun: Schöpfungslehre (Aachen: MM Verlag, 1997), 286–371; among the latter, see G. Gozzelino, Il mistero dell’uomo in Cristo. Saggio di protologia (Turin: Elledici, 1991), 236–343. The period spanning the late 1960s and early 1970s has been described as the eclipse of creation. The first to denounce the situation with these words—later borrowed by many others—was G. Hendry, professor at Princeton, in a lecture given before the assembly of the American Theological Society in April of 1971. See Hendry, “Eclipse of Creation,” Theology Today 28 (1972): 406–25. See Sanz, La relación entre creación y alianza; more briefly, Creation and Covenant, 217–53. As for materials published previously, the Münster notes reference the article on the axiom Gratia supponit naturam which Ratzinger wrote for the Festschrift of his mentor G. Söhngen. These serve as the basis for materials published later, both part of the entry “Schöpfung” which he wrote for the Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche and his contribution “Belief in Creation and the Theory of Evolution,” published in the late 1960s. We have provided these references in note 5 above. The Manuscripts of Joseph Ratzinger's Lectures on the Doctrine of Creation 291 Fall. The portion of the second chapter on the devil, as indicated in the bibliography, uses pages on the same subject that had been published a few years earlier in the book Dogma and Preaching. That book also contains reflections on evolution that we find in the third chapter of these notes. Here again, there is a dialogue with the thought of Monod which will appear again in some sections of his book on creation and the fall to which we have just referred. Finally, the last part of the fourth chapter has the same title and content (with modifications) of the conference he held a few years later. This was published as an appendix to the aforementioned book in editions beginning in 1996 under the title “The Consequences of Faith in Creation.” As I see it, two fundamental points characterize Ratzinger’s reflections in these Regensburg lectures: a serious concern over the disappearance of the doctrine of creation in theology, and the effort to show the indissoluble relationship between creation and redemption (covenant, salvation, worship, eschatology) in the Christian faith which has important consequences for the life of the Church and of the world. Our author tries always to find a way to maintain the substance of the truth of creation, on the one hand, and on the other, its intrinsic orientation to the Paschal mystery of Christ, which is made present to us in worship and in the liturgy. Summary The fact that these manuscripts belong to three decades that cover the entire span of Joseph Ratzinger’s teaching career (the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s) has allowed us to approach the thought of our author in its evolution from the beginning to the end of his academic life. In it, we have found elements that illustrate the presence of continuity within a number of fundamental principles along with elements of novelty. As we have already pointed out in our previous studies, there is a profound continuity between the manuscripts of Freising and Münster, which is quite logical considering that the distance between them is only six years. Even the “scholastic” style, quite pronounced in 1958 but less in 1964, represents an element of similarity—especially in comparison to the 1976 manuscript. In the 1958 Freising manuscript, there are further differences in detail in comparison to the 1964 manuscript, such as Ratzinger’s insistence on certain metaphysical categories to understand the doctrine, together with a “creaturely optimism” of clear Franciscan provenance. In 1964, on the other hand, a more thought-out development of most of the questions is given, and there are some absences such as that of the chapter on angels. 292 Santiago Sanz This itself testifies to the sensibilities of the ‘60s, when the anthropological turn within theology was felt. However, Ratzinger does not succumb to this turning, as it were. Rather, he always insists on the need to raise the anthropological question both in the case of metaphysics (at the philosophical level) and with regard to Christology (at the theological level). Precisely for this reason, the counterpoint of the 1976 manuscript is very interesting. One might find surprising its dedication of so much space to the topic of angels and demons. Ratzinger has a strong concern for dialogue with the philosophical and scientific currents of thought within his day. This leads him to set scholastic debates to the side (there is no trace here of matters very prominent in the first two manuscripts, such as the supernatural and original sin) in order to maintain his focus. In any case, it seems to me that, granted these natural differences, some of Ratzinger’s basic convictions not only remain intact but even appear to grow in importance over time. Along with the centrality of the dogma of creation as the foundation of God’s design in Christ, the growing importance that our author places on liturgy and worship stands out in a particular way. In other words, for Ratzinger the mystery of creation is oriented to its fulfillment in Christ, through which it receives its fullness of meaning. On the other hand, this does not detract from the fact that creation has its own integrity and is the foundation of God’s entire plan in Christ. N&V Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 293–314 293 Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor John Mark Solitario, O.P. St. Gertrude Priory Cincinnati, OH How much does the Church rely upon the work of any one expert when she spells out her official teaching? How much should an individual reader be aware of this dynamic? Measuring up the presence of a theologian in a Church document, such as Serge-Thomas Bonino did for Saint Thomas Aquinas in the apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia, is an important exercise for understanding the nature and development of Catholic doctrine.1 If Saint Thomas is an authority to engage and develop carefully, this must also be the case for Saint Augustine of Hippo, the “Doctor of Grace” by whom Saint Thomas was so deeply influenced.2 Mirroring Bonino’s method, here we identify and assess the presence of Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor, the momentous moral teaching of Pope Saint John Paul II that continues to generate discussion.3 The encyclical’s use of Saint Augustine has not been without criticism.4 Nor has the legacy of this most revered of Christian 1 2 3 4 See Serge-Thomas Bonino, O.P., “St. Thomas Aquinas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” trans. Dominic Langevin, O.P., The Thomist 80 (2016): 499–519. See Servais Pinckaers, The Sources of Christian Ethics, trans. M. T. Noble (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1995), for a study which shows Aquinas to be both a student as well as an innovator in a long tradition of scholarly Christian ethics begun by the saintly bishop of Hippo. See also Michael Dauphinais, Barry David, and Matthew Levering, eds., Aquinas the Augustinian (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2007), for a collection of essays exploring various ways in theology as a whole in which St. Thomas Aquinas benefitted from and innovated upon St. Augustine. For example, see the colloquium published in Nova et Vetera (English) 18, no. 1 (2020), by Mariusz Biliniewicz, Renée Köhler-Ryan, Helenka Mannering, and Christian Stephens. E.g., John J. O’Keefe, “No Place for Failure? Augustinian Reflections on Veritatis 294 John Mark Solitario, O.P. teachers been unreservedly accepted by all dedicated to Catholic moral theology in the recent past.5 Nevertheless, Saint Augustine’s profound presence deserves to be more fully treated. Not only are his works the most frequently cited of any Father in this outstanding papal encyclical but, as we shall see, an Augustinian spirit is evident from the formulation of its opening line: The splendor of truth shines forth in all the works of the Creator and, in a special way, in man, created in the image and likeness of God.6 Although the document’s indebtedness to the doctor of Hippo becomes apparent through understanding its explicit uses of his theology, I argue that even its title—Veritatis Splendor—is derived from Saint Augustine’s masterpiece of inquiry into the mystery of God, his De Trinitate, and reveals a much more profound reliance on his thought than otherwise evident. Bonino wants his project to be a service to the Church’s teaching office as exercised by the magisterium; we believe that approaching Veritatis Splendor with eyes open for Saint Augustine will be of similar service. Bonino’s particular objective is to “identify and analyze the Thomist doctrines referred to explicitly by Amoris Laetitia in order to receive them as an invitation to deepen, as a theologian, those aspects of St. Thomas’ teaching that seem to possess today for the Magisterium a particular relevance for the life of the Church.” 7 He asserts that the Tradition of the Church is “bipolar” insofar as the magisterium necessarily “discerns what constitutes the Tradition” and in turn requires a knowledge of the 5 6 7 Splendor,” in Veritatis Splendor: American Responses, ed. M. E. Allsopp, and John J. O’Keefe (Kansas City, Mo: Sheed & Ward, 1995), 16–37. See n10 below. E.g., John Mahoney, S.J., “The Legacy of Augustine,” in The Making of Moral Theology: A Study in the Roman Catholic Tradition (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 37–71. Mahoney is critical of the strong Augustinian “mood” which has clearly shaped moral theology in the Roman Catholic Church for fifteen hundred years. Although he characterizes St. Augustine as brilliant in his perception of life’s contrasts (e.g., self-love vs. love for God, man’s moral weakness vs. God’s strength, etc.), he asserts that his influence has led to an unhealthy pre-occupation with achieving freedom from sin rather than growth in virtue, a tormented and utilitarian view of sexual pleasure, and an inflexibility with respect to concrete moral choices. Also relevant to our purpose, Mahoney notes how Pope Pius XI reverently defined Augustine’s important relationship with Church teaching in the encyclical Ad Salutem (1930) and provided an “outstanding modern instance of the legacy of Augustine” (60) in his encyclical Casti Connubii (1930) treating Christian marriage. Pope St. John Paul II, Veritatis Splendor [VS] (1993), preamble. In this paper, I followed the Latin text and English translation as available at the Vatican website unless otherwise noted. Bonino, “St. Thomas Aquinas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” 501. Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 295 Tradition to be rightly interpreted as it issues new teachings.8 It is important, explains Bonino, to keep in mind that, when it adopts the work of any theologian, the magisterium need not try to recreate those doctrines in “their most perfect or pristine form.” Rather, it may take up an individual theologian’s teachings into a more authoritative project and “draw upon certain doctrines in order to represent the teaching of the Word of God for the benefit of the life and holiness of the Christian people.”9 The Church’s use of Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor reveals this type of approach, although one not appreciated by John J. O’Keefe’s Augustinian study of the encyclical. O’Keefe sides with those who believed that Pope Saint John Paul II used Saint Augustine, along with other biblical and patristic sources, with “a reckless disregard for historical circumstances and the original context of the texts from which he quotes.” 10 For O’Keefe, the encyclical is absent of Saint Augustine’s eschatology and “runs the risk of being pressed into the service of a self-righteousness that has little room for human failure.”11 In fact, for O’Keefe, “the Pope has embraced a view of Christian perfection similar to that resisted by Augustine.”12 Acknowledging the aforementioned “bipolar” view of the Church’s Tradition suggested by Bonino, then, we set out to examine those relevant Augustinian citations in Veritatis Splendor which reveal Pope Saint John Paul II’s guiding principles and their original inspiration.13 Conversely, this investigation of the document’s Augustinian sources will also help to “test and confirm continuity within the living Tradition of the Church,”14 and therefore to rightly interpret Veritatis Splendor. 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 See Bonino, “St. Thomas Aquinas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” 500. “Bipolar” is meant here in its more general sense such as “having or relating to two poles or extremities.” Langevin’s translation of the French “bipolaire” was part of a project entailing close collaboration with Bonino. Bonino, “St. Thomas Aquinas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” 500. O’Keefe, “No Place for Failure?,” 16. Although O’Keefe considers a use of sources re-bound by the “rule of faith” to be within the rights of a pontiff, here he judged the consequences to be tragic, enlisting St. Augustine for a theology of perfection more Pelagian than Augustinian (32). I intend to show how much Augustine’s theological thought does influence Pope St. John Paul II’s work, producing salutary effects which remain consistent with Augustine’s theology of grace. O’Keefe, “No Place for Failure?,” 17. O’Keefe, “No Place for Failure?,” 32. See Bonino, “St. Thomas Aquinas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” 519. Bonino, O.P., “St. Thomas Aquinas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” 501. 296 John Mark Solitario, O.P. As did Bonino with Aquinas, we limit the thrust of our attention in this project to the explicit references of Saint Augustine within the text or as indicated in the endnotes of Veritatis Splendor. Actually, this will prove an effective means to uncover a deeper use of Saint Augustine which permeates and shapes the document as a whole. In the first section, we locate the document’s fifteen direct or indirect references to Saint Augustine (i.e., those quoted in the text of the encyclical versus those confined to a footnote). We compare these references to the document’s use of other sources and describe how they are being used within the overall framework of Veritatis Splendor. The second section of the paper is divided according to the principal Augustinian themes taken up by Veritatis Splendor. Here we study the original context and meaning of the Augustinian references. While performing this comparison, we call attention as well to the new importance with which the magisterium has invested this fifth-century Father. We seek to understand how Saint Augustine’s work is being used to support the work of the Church as she exercises her official teaching office in this particular encyclical. Having identified, contextualized, and then re-contextualized the citations of Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor, in the concluding section we offer some observations on how a deeper knowledge of Saint Augustine’s work has increased our ability to understand and to live the Church’s teaching, especially concerning true moral freedom. Here we take the opportunity to refute those who, like O’Keefe and John Mahoney, believe that the Pope either altered Saint Augustine’s work for his own purposes or used Saint Augustine’s theology to impose upon the Church a set of views which are fundamentally outdated. We hope readers discover in the course of this study both something of the real Saint Augustine and a deeper appreciation for the way Catholic theology has developed by making reverent and intelligent use of his work. Fifteen Explicit References to Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor Veritatis Splendor contains fifteen explicit references to Saint Augustine’s corpus.15 15 Of the works in this table: In Iohannis Evangelium tractatus is found in vol. 36 of Corpus Christianorum Latina [CCL]; De Sermone Domini in Monte in CCL 35; Confessiones in CCL 40; De gratia et libero arbitrio in Patrologia Latina [PL] 44; De spiritu et littera in Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum [CSEL] 60; Enarratio in Psalmos in CCL 39; Contra Faustum in PL 42; De Trinitate in CCL 50/A; Contra mendacium in PL 40; De natura et gratia in CSEL 60. For the idea and layout of this table, I am indebted to Bonino’s own in “St. Thomas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” 501–2. Ch. 1, §13 Ch. 1, §15 Ch. 1, §17 Ch. 1, §21 Ch. 1, §22 Ch. 1, §23 Ch. 1, §24 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Location in Veritatis Splendor Quote in text and source in note 31 Quote in text and source in note 30 Quote in text and source in note 29 Quote in text and source in note 28 Quote in text and source in note 27 Indirect reference in text and source in note 24 Quote in text and source in note 23 Kind of Reference Freedom from sin Telling the significance of Sermon on the Mount Correspondence between serving God and freedom or serving law of sin and slavery Configuration of Christians as other “Christs” The primacy of love in the moral life The old law fulfilled by grace Prayer: “Grant what you command and command what you will” De Sermone Domini in Monte 1.1.1 In Johannis Evangelium tractatus 41.10 In Joannis Evangelium Tractatus 21.8 In Johannis Evangelium Tractatus 82.3 De spiritu et littera 19.34 Confessiones 1.029, 10.40 // De gratia et libero arbitrio 15 Source Theme In Iohannis Evangelium Tractatus 41.10 Source Text Shows “inseparable connection” between grace and exercise of freedom Summarizes “Pauline dialectic” of law and grace, showing primacy of grace Indicates how possible to follow Christ’s teaching Explains that conformity with Christ comes through a sacramental reconfiguration Explains gradualness of Christian freedom and perfection Support for importance of the Sermon on the Mount within Christ’s teaching Explains significance of the negative precepts of the Decalogue Use in Veritatis Splendor Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 297 Quotation text and source in note 92 11 Quote in text and source in note 140 Quote in text and source in note 182 13 Ch. 3, §87 Conclusion, §119 Note 162 14 15 Citation of Trent’s Decree on Justification, which quotes Saint Augustine Quotation in the text with citation in the footnotes (134) 12 Ch. 2, §81 Ch. 2, §51 Source Text De spiritu et littera 21.36, 26.46 Definition of God’s eternal law The universal access which all men have to the truth of the natural law Acts which are “themselves sins” are never justifiable In charity and truth, the Christian is both servant and free Christ provides sufficiently for all members of his Body God does not command the impossible De Trinitate 14.15.21 Contra mendacium 7.18 Enarratio in Psalmos, Ps 100[99], no. 7 In Johannis Evangelium tractatus 26.13 De natura et gratia 43.40 God is the reference point for truth Source Theme Explaining source of Aquinas’s saying Contra Faustum 22.27 Short quote incorpoEnarratio in Psalmos, Ps rated into an argument 72, no. 16 Kind of Reference Remote reference in text and source note 32 Quote in text and source in note 79 Ch. 2, §41 Location in Veritatis Splendor Ch. 1, §24 10 Ch. 2, §43 9 8 Upholds Church’s “constant teaching” with respect to following God’s commandments Ensures the simplicity of assenting to Christ, an invitation for all Explains that true freedom is found in obedience and love of God, as Jesus models Shows foolishness of “necessary sins” and/or of ends justifying means Defends universality of the natural law Explains basis of law with respect to duties and rights in human action Explains the context for human exercise of intellect and free will Use in Veritatis Splendor The new law implies the presence of the Holy Spirit in the believer 298 John Mark Solitario, O.P. Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 299 Of these references, eight are found in chapter 1 (“Christ and the Answer to the Question about Morality”), four appear in chapter 2 (“The Church and the Discernment of Certain Tendencies in Present-day Moral Theology”), one is in chapter 3 (“Moral Good for the Life of the Church and of the World”), one is in the conclusion, and one is limited to an endnote. As we will see in the second part of this paper, the high concentration of Augustinian references in chapter 1 supports a scriptural groundwork for the moral life as a graced sequela Christi (see §§19 and 21) while the references in chapters 2 and 3 become more technical concerning law, sin, and the authentic exercise of freedom. Whereas the citations in chapter 1 are meant to elucidate what the New Testament says about following the law of God in Christ, the Augustinian references in chapter 2 are included so as to explain the necessary basis of human freedom in God’s eternal law, as well as to expose the foolishness of a permissive attitude toward sin. Chapter 3 and the conclusion, each containing only one reference to Saint Augustine’s teaching, once again keep Christ, the model of loving obedience and the source of moral strength, before our eyes. Overall, the document uses Saint Augustine to underscore fundamental truths before it proceeds to address current challenges to Christian moral freedom. He is treated as a respected and wise authority. Mostly direct quotations, the Augustinians references in Veritatis Splendor come from a variety of locations within his corpus (we list them here in order of appearance): Enarrationes in Psalmos (2×), In Joannis Evangelium tractatus (5×), De Sermone Domini in Monte (indirect reference), De spiritu et littera (2×, once indirectly), Confessiones (1×), De gratia et libero arbitrio (1×), Contra Faustum (1×), De Trinitate (1×), Contra mendacium (1×), De natura et gratia (1×; within a quotation from Trent). Apparently, the document favors Augustine’s Tractates on the Gospel of John, although the themes cited from this source, which include freedom from sin, the power of love, and union with Christ, are developed also by means of the other sources just mentioned. Considering all the sources used by Veritatis Splendor, it is worth mentioning that fifteen out of forty-three patristic references belong to Saint Augustine. He is the third most-cited non-biblical source in Veritatis Splendor, after the Second Vatican Council (some 47×) and Saint Thomas Aquinas (19×). By comparison, Saint Ambrose of Milan is the second most-cited Church Father (5×). With the exception of Saints Justin Martyr, Ignatius of Antioch, and Gregory of Nyssa (all of whom are cited twice), no one else is cited more than once. The high amount of recourse to this “Doctor of Grace” signals that Saint Augustine is a pre-eminent patristic authority in the project of articulating just what the following of 300 John Mark Solitario, O.P. Christ entails for his Catholic Church. The fifteenth and final reference to Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor, found exclusively within note 162, displays for us the larger-than-life quality of Saint Augustine’s doctrine for the Church’s teaching tradition as a whole. This reference is really a citation from chapter 11 of the Council of Trent’s Decree on Justification. There we see the Church employing Saint Augustine’s words from De natura et gratia to affirm that God’s grace is always sufficient and that “God does not command the impossible.”16 This example serves as an indication of how Veritatis Splendor means to use Saint Augustine in stating its own authoritative teaching,17 even if its assimilation of his teaching is sometimes subtle. Moreover, such a combination of magisterial and patristic teaching testifies to the importance given to this principle, which insists upon the sufficiency of grace in the Christian moral life. Division and Analysis of Augustinian Themes Taken Up by Veritatis Splendor In a survey of Veritatis Splendor, considerable thematic unity among the fifteen explicitly Augustinian citations emerges. Here we indicate six broad “groupings” among them, not for the purpose of making things artificially neat, but in order to appreciate some distinctively Augustinian claims put at the service of the modern magisterium. The groupings we have devised are: the conception of law that has God as its source, authentic growth in freedom, Christ present in the moral life of the Christian, the dynamic between law and grace, sin, and the sufficiency of grace.18 For convenience and brevity, we collapse these themes into three steps that follow the 16 17 18 See Council of Trent, sess. VI, Decree on Justification Cum Hoc Tempore, ch. 11 (Denzinger- Hünermann, no. 1536). See VS, §115. These “Augustinian claims” of Veritatis Splendor might be compared with the “sevenfold splendor” which Michael Dauphinais identifies in “hierarchically descending sections,” all connected to the theme of “gift” in the Christian moral life. The sections are: the priority of divine revelation, the encountering of that revelation in the incarnate Word, the priority of faith in Christ which grounds the moral life, the divine and natural laws as proceeding from God and leading human beings to their fulfillment, conscience as deliberate and free participation in the moral law, the importance of concrete moral actions in shaping the moral life, and the mercy Christ offers to every sinner. Although Dauphinais does not specifically analyze the use of Augustine in Veritatis Splendor (mentioning only two of fifteen Augustinian citations), the closeness of our “Augustinian claims” to what he identifies as the document’s principal claims shows how important Augustine was as a source for developing these sections of Veritatis Splendor. See M. Dauphinais, “The Splendor and the Gift of the Christian Moral Life: Veritatis Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 301 progression of the three chapters of Veritatis Splendor. These three steps will be: (1) the believer’s fundamental association with Christ, (2) the law of God understood as “medicine” and “light,” and (3) the experience of obedience and freedom in the Christian moral life. Going back during each step to some of the pertinent locations in Saint Augustine’s works serves to better re-contextualize these significant citations. Then we will be closer to our goal of grasping their significance for Veritatis Splendor and, more generally, our becoming aware of just how profoundly Saint Augustine’s original doctrine is being used by the Church’s teaching office today. First, Veritatis Splendor teaches that there is no other way to live the Christian moral life than by seeking conformity to Christ and following his example. The fourth and fifth citations noted in the table above address this theme. The fourth, from In Joannis Evangelium tractatus, most directly addresses the Christo-centricity of the moral life as proposed by the encyclical: “Let us rejoice and give thanks,” exclaims Saint Augustine speaking to the baptized, “for we have become not only Christians, but Christ. . . . Marvel and rejoice: we have become Christ!”19 This quotation and the one that follows in Veritatis Splendor §22 serve to underscore the document’s emphasis on “drawing near” and even “entering into” Christ in order to find the answer to life’s most pressing questions.20 Clearly, the conformity to Christ evoked here is more than mere moral identification, such as a profound admiration for or empathy toward a heroic or tragic 19 20 Splendor at Twenty-five,” Nova et Vetera (English) 16, no. 4 (2018): 1261–312, at 1262–64. VS, §21. David Meconi, S.J., begins his study The One Christ with this citation from St. Augustine. He offers an expansive treatment of Augustine’s doctrine of deification as knowable through his theology of creation, the Incarnation, the bestowal of the Holy Spirit, and the Church’s sacramental life. Augustine believes that Christ’s holiness, which Christians experience in the sacraments, bestows upon them an unmerited “participation” in the divinity. The result for the Christian believer, explains Meconi, is that he can no longer live for himself alone: “In the unitive love of God, all Christian souls become one in that they form one Christ. . . . Exclusive love [on the other hand] is ultimately not love at all, but a concupiscence that evaluates another person in terms of oneself and not in terms of true charity, God.” Through its exposition of the Christian’s vocation to love ever more in the manner Christ loved, Meconi’s study supports the connection between the generally Christ-centered approach to morality in Veritatis Splendor, ch. 1, and the document’s insistence in chapters 2–3 on discrediting theories which permit a conflict between object and intention in the case of specific moral choices. See Meconi, The One Christ: St. Augustine’s Theology of Deification (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2013), 209–10. See VS, §8. 302 John Mark Solitario, O.P. figure. Rather, this “new life” (see Rom 6:3–11) wherein the baptized are “clothed in Christ” (see Gal 3:27) is described by the encyclical in terms of conformity at the deepest level of their beings. The first chapter of Veritatis Splendor explains the disciple’s deep acquaintance and transformation as fulfilling what he naturally is in virtue of being made in the image of God. Further, it explains that conformity to Christ through grace is accessible to the one who practices the Beatitudes, which are “in their originality and profundity . . . a sort of self- portrait of Christ, and for this very reason are invitations to discipleship and to communion of life with Christ.”21 Finally, in the Pope’s exhorting Christians to follow the sequela Christi, that is, to imitate Christ, Veritatis Splendor explains that this cannot be done in a superficial manner: “Following Christ is not an outward imitation, since it touches man at the very depths of his being. Being a follower of Christ means becoming conformed to him.”22 In citation 4, Saint Augustine indeed emphasizes that to heed the invitation issued by Jesus to the rich young man entails that “we have become not only Christians, but Christ.”23 This transformation into Christ is precisely how Veritatis Splendor presents the sequela Christi, which it explains is “the essential and primordial foundation of Christian morality” (§ 19). A closer study of the In Joannis Evangelium tractatus helps us to understand the depth as well as the distinction of the Christian transformation that appears in the first chapter of Veritatis Splendor. Citation 4 is originally part of a commentary on the following verses of John’s Gospel: “For the Father loves his Son and shows him everything that he himself does, and he will show him greater works than these, so that you may be amazed. For just as the Father raises the dead and gives life, so also does the Son give life to whomever he wishes” (John 5:20–23). Saint Augustine begins homily (the tractatus) 21 stating that the works of the Father and the Son vis-àvis mankind are truly “inseparable” (see John 5:19).24 With John 5:20, however, he feels that he must explain the apparent contradiction of “the Father loves the Son and shows him everything that he himself does.”25 Saint Augustine says: “If the Father makes anything, he does it through the Son; 21 22 23 24 25 VS, §16. VS, §21. VS, §21. St. Augustine, In Johannis Evangelium tractatus 21.1, in Homilies on the Gospel of John 1–40, trans. Edmund Hill, O.P., ed. Allan D. Fitzgerald, O.S.A., Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century [WSA] III/12 (New York: New City Press, 2009). This translation is used for all further citations from the In Joannis Evangelium tractatus, unless otherwise noted. Emphasis added. Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 303 if he makes it through his power and wisdom, it is not outside of himself that he shows him something to see, but it is in his very self that he shows him what he is doing.”26 The bishop of Hippo explains in this homily the distinction between the difference and the unity of the Father and the Son and of the difference and the unity between the Father and the Son and us. It is this teaching which explains the truth as well as the limitations of citation 4: “We have become not only Christians, but Christ.” Saint Augustine’s original text reminds his listeners that Christ typically did not use a common possessive pronoun in his regular speech concerning the first person of the Trinity. Rather, he would distinguish “my Father” and “your Father,” “my God” and “your God.”27 The great bishop further explained the significance of Christ’s words: All the same, he is not Christ’s Father in the same way as he is also our Father; Christ, after all, never joined us to himself so as to make no distinction between himself and us. He, I mean, is the Son equal to the Father, and co-eternal with the Father; we on the other hand have been made sons through the Son, adopted through the only Son.28 This, then, qualifies the way in which we are to understand citation 4: “Let us rejoice and give thanks.”29 Although Saint Augustine’s original lesson is much the same as that of Veritatis Splendor, in the former, conformity to Christ means growing into the “fullness of Christ . . . head and members.”30 Christ remains distinctly the Head of the Body. We remain the members who experience our sonship toward the Father through and in constant reference to him. It is within this special likeness that the Christian receives a truly supernatural hope for moral freedom and perfection. Second, Veritatis Splendor presents God’s eternal law as the source of all other laws, including the natural law and the divine revealed law. Therefore, God’s law can be experienced as mankind’s indispensable “medicine” and “light.” Five of the document’s uses of Saint Augustine either focus on God’s revealed law in its content (citations 1 and 2) or explain why the eternal law, which encompasses God’s design for all things, ought to be the basis for human behavior (citations 9–11). Here we treat one sample 26 27 28 29 30 St. Augustine, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus 21.2. St. Augustine, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus 21.3; see John 20:17 St. Augustine, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus 21.3. See Meconi, The One Christ, 213: “The Son of God became human so humans may become one with God, but that does not mean that humans will become God the same way the Son is God.” St. Augustine, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus 21.8. 304 John Mark Solitario, O.P. from each subgroup. First, we observe citation 2, which merely references book 1 of De Sermone Domini in monte without any quotation. Pope Saint John Paul II states in Veritatis Splendor §15 that “the ‘Sermon on the Mount’ [is] the magna carta of Gospel morality.”31 At this point in its first chapter, Veritatis Splendor presents the divine law as revealed first in the Decalogue and then fully manifested in Christ. Whereas the Decalogue lays out those “basic condition[s] for love of neighbor,” as well as for love of God, Christ’s life and sacrificial death embodies this authentic love for the Father and mankind.32 The encyclical uses Saint Augustine (and, incidentally, his teacher Saint Ambrose) to explain the extent to which Christ has “the fullness of the Law;” the Mosaic law will actually be the “image” of Christ, who “brings God’s commandments to fulfilment, particularly the commandment of love of neighbor, by interiorizing their demands and by bringing out their fullest meaning.”33 Although the term magna carta as used in Veritatis Splendor only bears indirect reference to Augustine’s reflection De Sermone Domini in monte, Saint Augustine’s text leaves little doubt that the Sermon contains Jesus’s words which are meant to inform the entire Christian moral life: If anyone were to ponder with piety and seriousness the sermon which our Lord Jesus Christ gave on the mount, I believe that we would discover there, as far as norms for high moral living are concerned, the perfect way to lead the Christian life. We would not be rash enough to make this promise ourselves, but we deduce it from the very words of the same Lord.34 Saint Augustine here recalls the Lord’s words at the end of the Sermon to defend this claim: “Anyone who hears these words of mine and does them I shall compare to a wise man who built his house upon rock. The rain fell, floods came, the winds blew and battered that house, and it did not fall, for it was built on rock” (Matt 7:24–25). Clearly, Jesus is saying at its conclusion that one who heeds the lesson of the Sermon is in the position 31 32 33 34 For an illuminating exposition of Augustine’s teaching on the Sermon and the Beatitudes as containing the “perfect rule of life” taught by Christ, see Pinckaers, Sources of Christian Ethics, 134–67 (ch. 6, “The Sermon on the Mount and Christian Ethics”). See VS, §§13–14. VS, §15. St. Augustine, De Sermone Domini in Monte 1.1, trans. Michael G. Campbell, O.S.A., in New Testament I and II, ed. Boniface Ramsey, WSA I/15–16 (2014). This translation is used for all further citations from De Sermone Domini in Monte unless otherwise noted. Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 305 to attain true beatitude. Of course, this was his starting point as he began the Sermon with the Beatitudes (Matt 5:3–11). With comparison to the old law, Saint Augustine continues his discourse, reflecting upon the true greatness of the new law of Christ in comparison with the old: It was the one God who gave the lesser precepts, through his holy prophets and servants, to a people for whom it was still opportune to be bound by fear, in accordance with a most just ordering of times. And through his Son he gave the greater ones to a people for whom it was fitting to be set free by charity. Since the lesser ones were given to those not yet fully mature and the greater ones to those who had come of age, they were given by him who alone is competent to dispense the appropriate medicine to the human race, suitable for its time.35 Here we see Saint Augustine’s understanding that the old and new laws are fundamentally related and function as that “medicine” designed by Providence for the care of mankind. God’s eternal law, here mediated through the divine revealed law, is salutary and designed to make man more himself. Moreover, there is a fullness in Jesus’s teaching of those “greater precepts” which depend on a freedom generated by love. Saint Augustine’s original vision in De Sermone Domini in monte seems germane to the purposes of Veritatis Splendor, which assesses Christ’s tour through various commandments, adding a positive precept to each (see Matt 5:21–48). The encyclical says the following: “Jesus shows that the commandments must not be understood as a minimum limit not to be gone beyond, but rather as a path involving a moral and spiritual journey towards perfection, at the heart of which is love (cf. Col 3:14).”36 This appears very much the spirit of Saint Augustine’s teaching as he “piously and seriously”37 considers the greatness of the Lord’s words in the Sermon. In light of the concerns expressed by O’Keefe (see note 10 above), it is important to note that Saint Augustine later qualified his teaching on the Beatitudes and human perfection in his Retractationes. There, he cites the apostles as evidence of the interior peace and a “certain perfection” (quadam perfectione) which the children of God can attain in this life, with the understanding that their struggles with the bodily passions continued and they only reached complete peace (pacem plenissimam) and perfection in heaven.38 We see that Veritatis Splendor’s 35 36 37 38 St. Augustine, De Sermone Domini in Monte 1.2. VS, §15. See St. Augustine, De Sermone Domini in Monte 1.1. St. Augustine, Retractationes 1.19[18].1–2 (Latin in PL 32; English in Ramsey, 306 John Mark Solitario, O.P. use of De Sermone Domini in monte does not contradict these later qualifications offered by Saint Augustine. Nevertheless, the saint’s later sobriety concerning the possibility of perfection in this life offers a word of caution to those who would underestimate the lingering influence of the passions as the graced soul moves through this life toward its heavenly fulfillment. Second, looking at the other subgroup (citations 9–11) which explains why the law of God ought to be the basis for human behavior, we focus on citation 11, taken from book 14 of Saint Augustine’s De Trinitate. Here we learn that God’s law illumines our fundamental nature like nothing else, if only we welcome this “light.” Chapter 2 of Veritatis Splendor, where this excerpt from Saint Augustine finds a new home, forms a steady argument to show that human freedom cannot be detached from God’s law. The Pope affirms that human freedom finds unique value in assisting reason in “discovering and applying the moral law. . .[with the] creativity and originality typical of the [acting] person.”39 To place freedom and divine law at odds actually would contradict what is found in Scripture (see Gen 2:16–17), which depicts them as both coming from the Creator and being entrusted to mankind.40 Notably, Veritatis Splendor defines eternal law in Saint Augustine’s words as “the reason or the will of God, who commands us to respect the natural order and forbids us to disturb it.”41 The document will explain natural law as that through which the eternal law applies to rational human beings who regulate their own “life and actions,” even as it further explains the unique privilege of those divine laws which have been explicitly revealed.42 Veritatis Splendor carefully explains that no law taking the eternal law as its source is meant to remain something remote or extrinsic as it applies to human beings. Instead, God’s law was given to Israel as a “gift and sign of election” in the form of the Decalogue. Furthermore, with the sending of Christ’s Spirit, God’s law has been placed in the hearts of believers not only to enlighten their minds but to incline their affections according to God’s will. In this context, it truly becomes “a law of perfection and of freedom” for men and women.43 Thus chapter 2 of Veritatis Splendor explains that the eternal law, applied to mankind and 39 40 41 42 43 New Testament I and II, 17). VS, §40. See VS, §41. VS, §43; see citation 10 in table above. VS, §§44–45, 50. VS, §§ 44–45. Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 307 knowable in both the “natural law” as well as the divine revealed law, is something truly illuminating for free human agents.44 To bolster this argument of Veritatis Splendor on the connection between living God’s law and experiencing true freedom, chapter 2 incorporates a crucial passage from Saint Augustine’s search for the image of God in man. The document’s opening words stated: “The splendor of truth shines forth in all the works of the Creator.” Although no citation to Saint Augustine appeared there, our study of §51 reveals that Veritatis Splendor borrows its opening language and direction from De Trinitate 14.15.21. We provide citation 11 in full, as well as the surrounding lines from Saint Augustine’s original text: Then where are these standards written down, where can even the unjust man recognize what being just is, where can he see that he ought to have what he does not have himself? Where indeed are they written but in the book of that light which is called truth, from which every just law is copied, and transferred into the heart of the man who does justice, not by locomotion but by a kind of impression, rather like the seal which both passes into the wax and does not leave the signet ring? As for the man who does not do justice and yet sees what should be done, he is the one who turns away from that light, and yet is still touched by it. But the man who does not even see how one ought to live has more excuse for his sin, because not knowing the law he is not a transgressor; yet from time to time he is touched by the brilliance of truth everywhere present, when he receives a warning reminder and confesses.45 In this rich text, Saint Augustine explains that to have contact with “the brilliance of truth everywhere present” (splendore aliquoties ubique prae- 44 45 In his essay following the release of Veritatis Splendor, Livio Melina highlights Pope St. John Paul II’s “rediscovery” after a tragic separation in the era of technological advance of that which joins human freedom and objective truth: the human person’s orientation toward the Good, manifest in the existence of the natural law, “shows the way” toward an authentic freedom (“Moral Questions and Evangelization Today,” Communio 21, no. 2 [1994]: 208–28). Melina holds this Gospel-supported insight (cf. Jn 8:32) in contrast with alternative ethical systems based on personal preference, utility, or consensus (222–23). St. Augustine, De Trinitate 14.15.21, in The Trinity, trans. Edmund Hill, O.P., WSA I/5 (Hyde Park, NY: New City Press, 1991). All following English translations of De Trinitate are from this source unless otherwise noted. Italicized text in the above quote denotes citation 11; see VS, §51. 308 John Mark Solitario, O.P. sentis veritatis46) is the special prerogative of all men. He holds that, in virtue of their powers of memory, thinking, and willing, all men may “turn to the Lord” just as they are able to turn toward themselves in reflection. What follows in De Trinitate 14.15.21 supplies a moral exhortation which serves to indicate mankind’s upward calling in Christ. The Christian life clearly necessitates a conversion from the state of the image of God tragically deformed by sin to the state of the image “renewed in the recognition of God.”47 Saint Augustine explains that this renewal is not completed at baptism, which only begins the process by removing a person’s sins. Rather, it is for man to “keep faith in his mediator” and progress toward the stage of “curing the debility [of the tarnished image] itself.”48 Saint Augustine maintains, much along the lines of the sequela Christi promoted in chapter 1 of Veritatis Splendor, that the human person’s achieving “perfect likeness” to God happens in an especially Christological mode, given his and our common humanity.49 With Saint Augustine’s special emphasis on the renewal of the “image of God,” reaching perfection in being able to see God, we cannot help but see the resemblance with the programmatic words of the preamble of Veritatis Splendor: The splendor of truth shines forth in all the works of the Creator and, in a special way, in man, created in the image and likeness of God (cf. Gen 1:26). Truth enlightens man's intelligence and shapes his freedom, leading him to know and love the Lord. Hence the Psalmist prays: “Let the light of your face shine on us, O Lord” (Ps 4:6).50 Evidently, the document radiates an Augustinian conception of the Christian moral life as enlightenment and image restoration through the gracefilled presence of Jesus. We can see a thematic and even verbal resemblance with De Trinitate 14 in Veritatis Splendor’s title line. The use of Psalm 4 46 47 48 49 50 Emphasis added. See PL 42:15, 21. St. Augustine, De Trinitate 14.16.22: “Induite novum hominem, qui renovatur secundum imaginem eius qui creavit eum”; see Col 3:9. St. Augustine, De Trinitate 14.17.23. See St. Augustine, De Trinitate 14.24. “Veritatis splendor in omnibus Creatoris operibus effulget, praesertim vero in homine facto ad imaginem et similitudinem Dei (Cf. Gen. 1:26): veritas illuminat intellegentiam hominisque libertatem informat qui hac ratione ad Dominum cognoscendum atque amandum adducitur. Propter hoc psalmista precatur: ‘Leva in signum super nos lumen vultus tui, Domine!’ (Ps. 4, 7)” (emphasis added; difference in verse number original to the Vatican-site Latin and English, for difference between the Vulgate and vernacular versions). Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 309 in particular has an Augustinian ring. In his commentary on this psalm, Saint Augustine explained the joy as well as responsibility of the Christian who bears the stamp of God’s image.51 The beauty of the image, captured in the moral lives of the saints, attracts others toward belief and powerfully announces to the world God’s glory.52 More than the other citations discussed so far, citation 11 reveals the extent to which the magisterium has assimilated Saint Augustine’s doctrine and wants the entire Church to benefit from his theological perspective. Anyone who, like O’Keefe, would criticize Veritatis Splendor for an omission of Saint Augustine’s eschatology or theology of grace should reconsider Pope Saint John Paul II’s message in light of these sources. The third and final theme from Veritatis Splendor which we address for its Augustinian underpinnings is the unity of law and grace, obedience, and freedom in the Christian moral life. The majority of Augustinian citations in the encyclical aid our understanding of this central dynamic (see citations 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 13, 14, and 15). Veritatis Splendor wages war against proportionalism and the relativization of moral norms. Furthermore, it upholds the Church’s revelation-and-reason-based teaching that “there are objects of the human act which are by their nature ‘incapable of being ordered’ to God, because they radically contradict the good of the person made in his image.”53 Moral teaching such as this aids and illumines, calling men and women to be “restored” in the light of the new law given in Jesus Christ. Chapter 3 of Veritatis Splendor, entitled “Moral Good for the Life of the Church and the World,” begins with the following affirmation: “Only the freedom which submits to the Truth leads the human person to his true good. The good of the person is to be in the Truth and to do the Truth.”54 Obedience to the truth as it has been designed by God is presented as a pre-condition for authentic human freedom. Even if obedi51 52 53 54 In Enarratio in Psalmos, Ps 4, no. 8, Augustine comments upon an alternate Latin version of Ps 4:7 which reads, “The light of your countenance is stamped upon us, O Lord.” He says: “The human individual has been made in God’s image and likeness, something which has been corrupted by sinning. Therefore true and eternal gladness is ours if we are minted afresh by being born again” (trans. Maria Boulding, O.S.B, in WSA III/15 [2000]; unless otherwise noted, English translation of Enarratio in Psalmos is taken from WSA III/15–20 [Expositions of the Psalms, vols. 1–6]). Augustine further explains that just as a citizen must “render unto Caesar” the tax-money bearing his stamp, so too human beings ought in justice to turn to the Lord, rendering their souls to God. See Melina, “Morality and Evangelization,” 228. VS, §80. VS, §84; cf. Pope St. John Paul II, Address to those taking part in the International Congress of Moral Theology, April 10, 1986, 1. 310 John Mark Solitario, O.P. ence to God’s law frequently serves to remind us of our proneness to sin, fundamentally it is meant to uphold the dignity of who we are by God’s design: “Freedom then is rooted in the truth about man, and it is ultimately directed towards communion.”55 It is Jesus Christ who teaches mankind to use its freedom not in selfish rebellion but in obedient love of God.56 In loving after the example of Christ, who was obedient always to the designs of the Father, Christians too are called to make “the gift of self in service to God and one’s brethren.”57 In its third and final chapter, Veritatis Splendor once more uses Saint Augustine’s words to explain this paradox of “obedient freedom.” Saint Augustine’s logic, quoted at some length in the encyclical, unfolds throughout a moving discourse: In the house of the Lord, slavery is free. It is free because it serves not out of necessity, but out of charity. . . . Charity should make you a servant, just as truth has made you free. . . . You are at once both a servant and free: a servant, because you have become such; free, because you are loved by God your Creator; indeed, you have also been enabled to love your Creator. . . . You are a servant of the Lord and you are a freedman of the Lord. Do not go looking for a liberation which will lead you far from the house of your liberator!58 Once again, a closer view of Saint Augustine’s passage (citation 14 in our table) in its original context will assist our reading of Veritatis Splendor. Taken from his Enarratio on Psalm 100 [99 in the Septuagint], the passage was a commentary on the second verse: “Serve the Lord with gladness!” The paragraph immediately preceding, which comments on “Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the lands!,” addresses a theme we have already noted in Saint Augustine’s thought: the vestiges of God contained in creation as well as man’s likeness to God cause him to rejoice and to further seek God out, growing in knowledge and love.59 The second verse of Psalm 100 with Saint Augustine’s accompanying commentary in the Enarratio appropri55 56 57 58 59 VS, §85. VS, §§86–87. VS, §87. St. Augustine, Enarratio in Psalmos, Ps 100[99], no. 7: “Libera servitus est apud Dominum; libera servitus, ubi non necessitas, sed caritas servit. . . . Servum te caritas faciat quia liberum te veritas fecit. . . . Simul es servus et liber: servus, quia factus es; liber quia amaris a Deo a quo factus es: immo etiam inde liber, quia amas eum a quo factus es . . . Servus es Domini, libertus es Domini; non te sic quaeras manumitti, ut recedas de domo manumissoris tui” (quoted in VS, §87). Cf. St. Augustine, Enarratio in Psalmos, Ps 100[99], no. 6 (trans. Maria Boulding, O.S.B., in WSA III/19 [2003]). Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 311 ately matches the movement of Veritatis Splendor; here we see mankind, fallen and in the process of being remade in accord with God’s image, called toward the paradox of obedient freedom: “In the house of the Lord, slavery is free.”60 In the original text, Saint Augustine assures his reader that, unlike all other forms of servitude, in the service of the Lord there is “no complaining, . . . no grumbling, no resentment. No one begs to be emancipated from that service, because it is so delightful that all of us have been redeemed.”61 He exhorts anyone who experiences the Lord’s service as bondage to be patient, because these chain-like sufferings—attributable to past sins rather than to the Lord—will be made into “adornments” in time. As seen above in the excerpt used by Veritatis Splendor, the ultimate measure for the freedom experienced while in service to the Lord is love: “[You are] a free person because you are loved by God who made you; and moreover free because you love him by whom you were made.” Thus love is said to make all the difference, making what would be forced effort into something voluntary and free. The connection to the truth about Christ and human nature, created, fallen, and redeemed is also stated there: “Servum te caritas faciat quia liberum te veritas fecit” (“Love has made you a servant because truth has made you free”62). Saint Augustine connects this statement to the example and teaching of Christ in at least two Scripture passages which Veritatis Splendor has already referenced in chapter 3: “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” ( John 8:32) and “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” ( John 15:13). Saint Augustine’s lesson, re-presented with similar argumentation in Veritatis Splendor, is beautiful in its original prose. Both carry this message: God’s servant, once a slave of sin but now freely a servant in imitation of Christ’s charity, can and must rejoice in his new-found freedom. Understanding Veritatis Splendor and Moral Theology with Augustinian Intuitions With this paper we have tried to recognize in a way similar to Bonino in his study of the explicit references to Saint Thomas Aquinas in Amoris Laetitia that an investigation into the Augustinian citations in Veritatis Splendor is only the beginning of a larger project. In Bonino’s own words, 60 61 62 A dynamic translation of “Libera servitus est apud Dominum” in Enarratio in Psalmos, Ps 100[99], no. 7 (CCL 39:1397), as translated in VS, §87. Boulding translates as “Slavery to the Lord is freedom” in WSA II/19. St. Augustine, Enarratio in Psalmos, Ps 100[99], no. 7. St. Augustine, Enarratio in Psalmos, Ps 100[99], no. 7 (trans. mine). 312 John Mark Solitario, O.P. to remain with only a study of the explicit references “leaves in the shadows everything in the document that springs from the profound fertilization of general Catholic culture and magisterial teaching that has transpired through many centuries of symbiotic activity with [in our case, Augustinian thought].”63 We have attempted in the previous sections to show that a study of the explicit references to Saint Augustine leads one quite naturally to see other ways in which his theological thought shapes the words of the magisterium in Veritatis Splendor. We especially pointed out both the footnotes and the terminology that reveal a tradition of Augustinian “fertilization” with respect to the magisterium. Exceptional among the citations from Veritatis Splendor that we explored was book 14 of De Trinitate, the original context of citation 11 (see the table above). It offers a truly remarkable synopsis of Saint Augustine’s great quest to find the image of God in man. The great African bishop explains there that many aspects of God’s creation, but most especially his own image placed within man’s deepest being, make man receptive to the “splendor of truth” and the light of faith. Saint Augustine holds such a graced encounter to be possible even for the habitual sinner: But when the mind truly calls its Lord after receiving his Spirit, it perceives quite simply—for it learns this by a wholly intimate instruction from within—that it cannot rise except by his gracious doing, and that it could not have fallen except by its willful undoing. . . . Not that it remembers him because it knew him in Adam, or anywhere else before the life of this body, or when it was first made in order to be inserted into this body. . . . Yet it is reminded to turn to the Lord, as though to the light by which it went on being touched in some fashion even when it turned away from him.64 This is the same process which, as we have seen, is described in chapter 1 of Veritatis Splendor. Moral conversion begins by meeting Christ in his Church and thereby availing oneself of God’s grace. At this point, given its native ability to know and to love its Creator, the soul can “turn to the Lord” and be both healed and enlightened. Repeating the injunction to “turn to the Lord” again in De Trinitate 16.22, Saint Augustine indicates the path that must be taken by the one who has welcomed the “brilliance of truth”65: 63 64 65 Bonino, “St. Thomas Aquinas in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia,” 499. St. Augustine, De Trinitate 14.15.21. St. Augustine, De Trinitate 14.15.21. Saint Augustine in Veritatis Splendor 313 [The human soul] cannot reform itself in the way it was able to deform itself. As [the apostle] says elsewhere, Be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new man who was created according to God in justice and the holiness of truth (Eph 4:23). “Created according to God” means the same as “to the image of God” in another text. But by sinning man lost justice and the holiness of truth, and thus the image became deformed and discolored; he gets those qualities back again when he is reformed and renovated.66 Chapter 2 of Veritatis Splendor reflected on this profound interior renewal which comes when God’s law in the Holy Spirit is embraced. As for the mention of man being “created according to God” or “to the image of God” in both his creation and restoration to grace, Veritatis Splendor teaches this lesson from its first paragraph.67 The document makes multiple references to either Christ as the “image of God,” Christians being especially in Christ’s image, or all human beings possessing the image of God.68 Unfortunately, scholars like O’Keefe and Mahoney seem to miss the significance of this deeper inculcation or “fertilization” with Augustinian thought in Veritatis Splendor. Indeed, the encyclical directs one along the same “high road” as did Saint Augustine, but never forgets that God’s grace, coming from a personal knowledge of Jesus Christ, is what makes this journey possible. O’Keefe is right to bring attention to Saint Augustine’s mature and more nuanced assessment of the human condition and the fullness of peace that he believed only to be attainable in heaven. But the African bishop’s later Retractiones do not negate his theology 66 67 68 St. Augustine, De Trinitate 16.22. The formulation ad imaginem Dei appears in Augustine, De Trinitate 14.16.21. We see this unique phrase appear in the first paragraph of Veritatis Splendor with reference to Gen 1:26 but not to St. Augustine: “Veritatis splendor in omnibus Creatoris operibus effulget, praesertim vero in homine facto ad imaginem et similitudinem Dei…” (Cf. Gen. 1:26). See J. E. Sullivan, O.P., The Image of God: The Doctrine of St. Augustine and Its Influence (Dubuque, IA: Priory, 1963), for an early study of Augustine’s developing quest for the image of God in man in De Trinitate, with special attention given to the moral dynamism involved in his most mature triad of acts of self- knowledge, self-love, and memory in the human being who is mindful of his Creator. See also D. Juvenal Merriell, To the Image of the Trinity (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1990), for a careful account of how Aquinas, as the reader of Augustine par excellence, gradually came to understand Augustine’s account as providing not merely a set description of how man was created, but as indicating a dynamic tendency toward perfection to the image of God present within fundamental human nature when it is open to grace. For examples, see VS, §§19, 38, 99. 314 John Mark Solitario, O.P. of Christian perfection as it is meant to begin in this life. Nor do the reflections of Pope Saint John Paul II forget the Christological basis for authentic moral transformation, which can start now, in this life: [Christ] forms us according to his image, in such a way that the traits of his divine nature shine forth in us through sanctification and justice and the life which is good and in conformity with virtue. . . . The beauty of this image shines forth in us who are in Christ, when we show ourselves to be good in our works.69 Mahoney’s criticism of a long-lingering Augustinian “mood” taken up by the Pope (see note 5 above) fails to acknowledge the virtuous freedom which the “Doctor of Grace” presented and hoped for as a real possibility. Saint Augustine’s assessment of fallen humanity, as sober as it is, anticipates the enlightenment, healing, and freedom to love that are never far away for the soul who looks to Christ. The magisterium clearly holds out a similar hope. In Veritatis Splendor the Church consistently shows a willingness to hear, reference, and respond to patristic and Augustinian thought in order to advance a compelling theological account of morality for an age tempted to deny the reality of sin as well as the possibility of virtue. Like the young man in the Gospel account, people today can expect to hear from the Church a law and love that can transform and raise human beings to unforeseen heights. The Catholic Church rightly directs such seekers— those who would recognize both the just demands of God’s law and their desire for mercy and healing—to her Redeemer.70 We see through the encyclical’s words and their sources the affirmation that a life surrendered and lived according to the Truth revealed in Christ is indeed a life of N&V obedient love, profound freedom, and transcendent beauty. 69 70 VS, §73. The words used are those of St. Augustine’s contemporary, St. Cyril of Alexandria. VS, §§103–5. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 315–330 315 After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality Olli-Pekka Vainio University of Helsinki Helsinki, Finland In debates, it is common to summon the concept of “reason” or “rationality” as neutral arbiters. However, there is something problematic in this proposal, as it erroneously suggests that rationality is something completely self-evident, transparent, and free from interpretation.1 Over the course of history, all the great words, including “reason” and its derivatives have been dressed in a wide variety of garments. Moreover, is it not often at the heart of the disagreement that we disagree over what is in fact rational? Providing rationality as a solution to the problem of rationality does not seem to help us much.2 One of the key themes of Alasdair MacIntyre’s career has been to analyze this conundrum.3 His influential and much discussed works After Virtue 1 2 3 Why is it that common sense is being offered in this way as a solution to the various problems? Over the past one hundred years, technology has evolved at an accelerating rate. At the same time, reasoning about values (or any classic philosophical questions) has not developed much in the last couple of thousand years. As science progresses in the field of technology but philosophy, ethics, and theology are constantly revolving around the same basic exchanges, it is quite natural to bet on the horse that even seems to be moving forward. But in this case, technical reason is assumed to solve problems that are not even within its jurisdiction. See Brandon Harnish, “Alasdair MacIntyre and F. A. Hayek on the Abuse of Reason,” The Independent Review 15, no. 2 (2010): 179–99. The same applies to other generic concepts such as “love,” “justice,” “moderation,” and so on. See also Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 1990), 172–73. MacIntyre (born 1929, Glasgow) is one of the most influential moral philosophers of our time. He has taught at various universities, including Leeds, Oxford, Duke, 316 Olli-Pekka Vainio (1981), Whose Justice? Which Tradition? (1988), and Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (1990) are reviews of the history of Western philosophy that attempt to uncover the connections of given ideals of rationality with particular traditions.4 In this way he provides a critique of the Enlightenment type of reason that presents itself as free from all traditions, and as thus being universal. However, the mere critique of the Enlightenment is often taken to be a concealed argument for relativism. If rationality is born within and bound by a tradition, is the truth also defined by the criteria adopted by each community? In this article, I will look at MacIntyre’s views that are related to the problem of relativism. My focus is on the Thomistic philosophy of his late career, through which he seeks to complement the shortcomings of his previous thinking. Incipient Thomism is already part of Whose Justice? and Three Rival Versions, but only in his essays and other works written since the late 1990s does MacIntyre present his theory of knowledge more accurately. MacIntyre’s thinking has evolved from the communitarian sociology of knowledge towards Thomistic realism. His Thomistic turn can be seen as an answer to the accusations of relativism, but does this mean that his system devolves into conservatism and authoritarianism, as some of his critics have argued? Or will relativism continue to bother MacIntyre’s system?5 Reason and History For MacIntyre, rationality is not an abstract principle or an allegedly neutral method, but a complex and ever-evolving set of arguments. Rationality is holistic: it is not just about individual claims, for it is comprehensively linked to a whole group of beliefs through which the 4 5 and Notre Dame. He converted to Roman Catholicism in the early 1980s, and since then his philosophical project has been influenced by the Catholic intellectual tradition, especially Thomism. See Bruce W. Ballard, Understanding MacIntyre (Lanham, MD: University of Press of America, 2000). Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue, 2nd ed. (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 1984); MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 1988); MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions. In addition to these three groundbreaking books, his virtue project continues in the following later works: Alasdair MacIntyre, Dependent Rational Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues (Chicago: Open Court, 1999); MacIntyre, Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity: An Essay on Desire, Practical Reasoning and Narrative (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016). This has been suggested by, e.g., Timothy Mosteller, Relativism: A Guide for the Perplexed (London: T&T Clark, 2008), 78–89. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality 317 individual perceives his place in reality and evaluates what a good life should be.6 MacIntyre sums up the idea of tradition-based rationality as follows: “There is no standing ground, no place for enquiry, no way to engage in the practices of advancing, evaluating, accepting, and rejecting reasoned argument apart from that which is provided by some particular tradition or other.” 7 In other words, arguments do not float in the air, for they are always related to the history of each community. Traditions are “socially embodied arguments.”8 As a result, “to justify is to narrate how the argument has gone so far.”9 According to the ideal of the Enlightenment, rationality is something that exists outside traditions, while MacIntyre argues that rationality is always internal to a tradition. If the Enlightenment view were true, we should have some universal means of dealing with differences between various traditions by relying on this general principle of rationality. However, according to MacIntyre, we have good reason to consider this notion to be wrong, because no philosopher who has followed the Enlightenment view has been able to tell us what these generally accepted principles are—or to provide us with a generally accepted interpretation of these principles.10 In other words, according to MacIntyre’s critique, the Enlightenment is a failed project according to its own criteria. The Enlightenment not only failed to define commonly agreed principles; it also made it much more difficult to have a debate on the nature of such principles. The reason for this is that it offers a too simple and totalizing idea of what is rational, which is also unable to justify why it should be listened to in the first place. After all, the Enlightenment appears to be just another contingent tradition among others.11 6 7 8 9 10 11 Alasdair MacIntyre, “Philosophy Recalled to Its Tasks: A Thomistic Reading of Fides et Ratio,” in The Tasks of Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 179–96. MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 350. MacIntyre, After Virtue, 222: “A living tradition then is as an historically extended, socially embodied argument.” MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 8. Micah Lott, “Reasonably Traditional: Self-Contradiction and Self-Reference in Alasdair MacIntyre’s Account of Tradition-Based Rationality,” Journal of Religious Ethics 30, no. 3 (2002): 317. E.g., Alasdair MacIntyre, “Some Enlightenment Projects Considered,” in Ethics and Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 172–85: “Notice then that it is not just in its inability to provide rationally justifiable and agreed moral values and principles that the Enlightenment and its heirs have failed. The failure of those modern institutions that have been the embodiment of the best 318 Olli-Pekka Vainio Against this, MacIntyre presents his own theory, which can be summarized in the following five theses:12 1. Rationality is always tied to the history of the tradition that gave rise to it. 2. Rationality is therefore only valid in relation to its own tradition. 3. Dissenting traditions cannot rely on any criterion of rationality outside traditions in the event of disagreement. 4. Competing traditions cannot overturn each other on their own criteria of rationality. 5. However, a tradition may find itself in a situation where it has to recognize another rival tradition as a better one. As soon as MacIntyre describes his own model (which is just a description of what the world is like, not a prescription of what it should be like), he points out how two challenges, relativism and perspectivism, arise. Here “relativism” means that a sensible debate and a rational choice between traditions is impossible, and perspectivism makes it impossible to make universal truth claims.13 If the Enlightenment suggested a universal method that provides us with one truth to solve the problem of knowledge, postmodern thinkers 12 13 social and political hopes of the Enlightenment is quite as striking. And those institutions fail by Enlightenment standards. For they do not provide—in fact they render impossible—the kinds of institutionalized reading, talking and arguing public necessary for effective practical thought about just those principles and decisions involved in answering such questions as: ‘How is a human life to be valued?’ or ‘What does accountability in our social relationships require of us?’ or ‘Whom, if anyone, may I legitimately deceive?’ —questions to which we need shared answers. And there is no type of institutional arena in our society in which plain persons—not academic philosophers or academic political theorists—are able to engage together in systematic reasoned debate designed to arrive at a rationally well-founded common mind on these matters, a common mind which might then be given political expression. Indeed the dominant forms of organization of contemporary social life militate against the coming into existence of this type of institutional arena. And so do the dominant modes of what passes for political discourse. We do not have the kinds of reading public necessary to sustain practically effective social thought.” See also Luke Bretherton, Hospitality as Holiness: Christian Wittness Amid Moral Diversity (Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2006), 16. E.g., MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 350–56. MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 352. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality 319 (MacIntyre uses the term “Post-Enlightenment,” which he employs to underline postmodernism’s dependence on the Enlightenment) provide a reverse solution to the problem. According to postmodernism, we really do have only one solution, and it is to give approval to all traditions. Each tradition offers one perspective on the same problem, and none of them are true or false as such. MacIntyre sees the Enlightenment and postmodernity as two sides of the same coin. What they have in common is that neither of them is able to see rationality as emerging from human experience. Instead, both of them are inaccurate, unhistorical, and unable to do justice to a phenomenological analysis of what human reasoning is in practice. According to MacIntyre, traditions go through three stages of development. In the first phase, nothing actually challenges the authoritative views and they are adopted as they are. In the second phase, one has to deal with a competing tradition and the differences between the traditions become visible. The third stage begins with the assessment, application, and re-formulation of given views. In this way, traditions develop when they come into contact with other traditions. When the encounter is particularly serious, “an epistemological crisis” takes place. In this case, tradition A notices a problem in its system that it cannot solve on its own. At the same time, it may notice that tradition B contains ways to solve the problem. In this case, A adopts something that used to be only B’s property.14 MacIntyre’s goal is therefore to provide a model of rationality that at the same time recognizes the context of rationality without collapsing into relativism. However, several critics have argued that his model may not be able to avoid relativism. We will next look at these claims. Reason and the Challenge of Relativism Relevant critiques of MacIntyre on this theme can be summarized as follows: 1. Although MacIntyre denies the existence of rationality beyond tradition, he nevertheless provides a way of assessing traditions independent of, or transcending, the traditions.15 14 15 MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 361–66. MacIntyre’s original essay on the epistemological crises dates back to 1977, but he continues to return to this theme in his later works. Jennifer A. Herdt, “Alasdair MacIntyre’s ‘Rationality of Traditions’ and Tradition-Transcendental Standards of Justification,” The Journal of Religion 78, no. 4 (1998): 524–46. See also Lott, “Reasonably Traditional.” 320 Olli-Pekka Vainio 2. MacIntyre’s view of rationality seems to require simultaneous adherence both to open-endedness and to certain predetermined outcomes.16 3. MacIntyre is forced to create a “liberal” metatradition independent of past traditions that is capable of behaving in a virtuous manner in epistemological crises.17 Jennifer Herdt, among others, has formulated a detailed criticism of MacIntyre, seeking to locate a contradiction in his thinking. According to Herdt, MacIntyre cannot both stick to the notion of reason as dependent on tradition and, at the same time, attempt to evaluate traditions, since this principle, which is used to provide better explanations, must ultimately be part of a partisan tradition that is not recognized by everyone. So, does MacIntyre contradict himself? To answer this question, a closer look is needed to see exactly what MacIntyre means by tradition and how he sees the relationship between the different traditions. First of all, according to MacIntyre, rationalities are not entirely incommensurable.18 In the event of a disagreement, for example, we would not even be able to know what we are disagreeing about if there were no common ground. Different traditions are likely to sign on to the same rules of logic. In addition, traditions can share many more or less crucial fundamental beliefs. MacIntyre distinguishes between weak and strong standards of rationality. Weak standards include, for example, the rules of logic mentioned above, such as the law of contradiction. As a rule, weak standards are common to all traditions. However, separated from individual traditions, they are quite worthless and cannot actually solve disputes between traditions that are axiomatic in nature. Strong standards, on the other hand, are traditions’ own criteria; they are local applications of universal rules, which give traditions their typical character. Weak standards will therefore not help us to decide which tradition is right. But what is really at stake when the explanatory power is described as a way to resolve epistemological crises? 16 17 18 John Haldane, “MacIntyre’s Thomist Revival: What Next?,” in After MacIntyre: Critical Perspectives on the Work of Alasdair MacIntyre (Cambridge: Polity, 1994), 91–107. Ian Markham, Truth and the Reality of God (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1998). MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 370–88; Bretherton, Hospitality as Holiness, 26–30. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality 321 In many places, MacIntyre underlines precisely the transparency and open-endedness of reasoning: we do not know in advance which solutions are right. At the same time, especially after his late Thomistic turn, he sought to emphasize the teleological nature of reasoning. However, the obvious question arises: is the question of transparency only a red herring if the results are already clear? MacIntyre is fully aware of this problem. He addresses the same issue in relation to the Fides et Ratio encyclical and points out how the basic criticism in this text puts its finger on this particular problem.19 If the encyclical intends to guarantee to philosophy autonomy in relation to theology, why does it seem to favor Thomism as the best available philosophical and theological method? MacIntyre strives to solve this dilemma by creatively applying pragmatist philosophy and the thinking of Thomas Aquinas. Here the concept of first principle becomes a key element.20 The first principles are the assumptions underlying all thinking and knowledge acquisition. Unlike the Cartesian solution, MacIntyre suggests that we may not always know what these principles are. Only when the fact-finding process has been completed will we be able to show how our results follow from precisely these specific principles. However, the first principles do not remain completely obscured, and when they are revealed in due course, they do not come as a surprise, but are found to have been an organic part of knowledge acquisition all the time. According to MacIntyre, it is possible for us to “know without yet knowing that we know.”21 In Cartesian epistemology, which MacIntyre considers to be a failure, we need to know that we know in order to really know anything. The Cartesian model looks back at the factor that justifies our beliefs and from which all other beliefs can be derived. The Thomistic model, on the other hand, looks forward towards the telos, the end and goal—which ultimately guarantees the legitimacy of the belief. In the case of knowledge acquisition, this means that the decision is presumed to be correct even if it cannot yet be proved to be so. As a prooftext, MacIntyre quotes lectio 3 of Aquinas’s commentary on book I of Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics. We may not know the absolute answer, for example, in the case 19 20 21 MacIntyre, “Philosophy Recalled”; Alasdair MacIntyre, “Truth as Good: A Reflection on Fides et Ratio,” in Tasks of Philosophy, 213; Alasdair MacIntyre, God, Philosophy, Universities (London: Continuum, 2009), 8. Especially Alasdair MacIntyre, “Moral Relativism, Truth, and Justification,” in Tasks of Philosophy, 52–73. Alasdair MacIntyre, “First Principles, Final Ends, and Contemporary Philosophical Issues,” in Tasks of Philosophy, 148–51. 322 Olli-Pekka Vainio of a mathematical proof, but we can know it in a limited sense, as in anticipating the outcome (praecognitio). MacIntyre complements this image with Nicomachean Ethics 6.9 (1142a), where it is stated that young people cannot have the practical wisdom required for their ethical way of life and practice because they lack experience. However, not just any experience whatsoever provides the necessary abilities to act ethically; only a life that is oriented towards the good and values the right virtues in the right way can contribute to the growth of practical wisdom. In other words, the end result is anticipated in advance, although it is not fully known.22 The relationship between the first principles and the information derived from them is always dialectical.23 It is like a construction project in which the builder has an idea of what a house should be like in order to be livable. However, the builder does not have detailed plans of the house, and he may be unable to explain all the assumptions on which he will take action. The plans of the house can be drawn only after the house has been completed, and the principles used to build it can be verified only afterwards. So what are these first principles? According to MacIntyre, the first principle is always determined by the goal that each person pursues. Each objective can be achieved only by certain appropriate means of achieving that particular objective. Arkhe (archē) and telos are thus intimately linked.24 Jean Porter points out that the role of first principles is not epistemic, but logical and conceptual.25 The nature of the first principles is that they cannot be verified, though they are used to give the world an intelligible structure. They must be presumed to exist in order to have a coherent structure of human reality. 22 23 24 25 MacIntyre, God, Philosophy, Universities, 152–53. MacIntyre refers here to John Henry Newman to demonstrate how pre-philosophical convictions play a major role in all knowledge acquisition. These assumptions guide our thinking so that we either accept or reject claims as they resonate with our existing beliefs. MacIntyre claims that it is the advantage of Thomism to openly recognize these meta-level commitments. MacIntyre, “First Principles,” 150, 160–61, 165. MacIntyre sets his Thomistic-Aristotelian model against the other two theoretical models. Against Cartesian solutions, he notes that we must start where we are instead of trying to find a neutral starting point. Against Hegel, he claims that we must learn to be contented with fragmentary and fallibilist knowledge that is never perfect. MacIntyre, “First Principles,” 174–77. Jean Porter, “Tradition in the Recent Work of Alasdair MacIntyre,” in Alasdair MacIntyre: Contemporary Philosophy in Focus, ed. Mark C. Murphy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 51. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality 323 Why Thomism? But why should we think that the Thomistic solution as described by MacIntyre is the correct one? First of all, the fact that a theory originates from a tradition does not exclude the possibility that it may be true for everyone. But on what grounds does he think that Thomism is better than its rivals. Macintyre’s answer is astute. According to him, we already are Thomists, even if we do not recognize it. Secondly, the fact that this cannot be recognized is an indication of the incoherencies within the system, which is in itself a reason to be critical of that system.26 MacIntyre admits that both encyclopedists working in an Enlightenment type of tradition and postmodern genealogists are unlikely to explicitly favor Thomism.27 He acknowledges that the main philosophical trajectories of our day have chosen other routes besides Thomism. Against this background, he provides a genealogical interpretation of the history of Western philosophy, in which after the Enlightenment there is a turn away from the teleological interpretation of reality. Over time, this trajectory will take a number of different forms, which MacIntyre considers to be a kind of mirror image of the Aristotelian-Thomistic model. It is essential that these models arise from the attempt to avoid a teleological (and hence theological) interpretation of reality, and the internal problems of all these models are precisely due to the rejection of the Aristotelian-Thomistic theory of knowledge.28 26 27 28 MacIntyre, “Philosophy Recalled,” 192: “But the necessary conditions for its not being absurd, the necessary conditions for the possibility of the completion of the human questioning enterprise, are just those specifed by Thomistic realism in its account of what is required for perfected understanding and of what it is that makes such understanding possible. Thomistic realism is in this way a doctrine presupposed by the questioning of plain persons. And its vindication is a vindication of that questioning as well as of the enquiries of philosophers, Thomistic and nonThomistic alike, who extend further the questioning of plain persons. It follows that any type of philosophy that is to be able to function as philosophy must function, if it is to achieve its own ends, may be nonThomistic or even antiThomistic in many respects—as were the philosophies of Scotus and Pascal and Newman, as are the philosophies of the phenomenological and of the Eastern Orthodox traditions—but that they will have to find some place for those truths that were classically articulated as the doctrine of Thomistic realism.” In Three Rival Versions, MacIntyre uses these two concepts to mark the abstract philosophy of the Enlightenment, which searches for contextless knowledge (encyclopaedia), and postmodernism (genealogy), which emphasizes the absolute relativity of all knowledge. See, for example, MacIntyre’s analysis of Derrida’s thought in “First Principles,” 151–54. 324 Olli-Pekka Vainio However, all philosophers confirm the teleological nature of reality in their own practice, even if they reject it on a theoretical level. However, those who reject teleology face a dilemma. Such a philosopher inevitably sees the transition away from the Aristotelian-Thomistic model as a positive development. But as a development towards what? If a positive response is given, this indicates that something is being pursued, but this is something that was just banned a minute ago. If one does not want to admit this, then the result is an idea of a philosophy in which it is no longer possible to achieve anything. We can then ask whether this itself is an achievement or not. In this way, MacIntyre seeks to make manifest the performative contradiction in rival systems.29 Thomistic Realism and the Progressive Nature of Knowledge MacIntyre’s earlier philosophy has been considered to be anti-realistic by some of his critics.30 However, his later Thomistic turn exhibits an explicit commitment to realism.31 What does he mean by this? First, the truth is understood to be the equivalence (adequatio) between the intellect and the object. Secondly, understanding is a teleological activity. It is natural for humans to seek to understand the nature of things and their mutual relationships. According to Aquinas, we cannot have access to the essence of things as such, but the essence of a thing is understood through its effects. This means that our knowledge of the world is understood to be a progressive movement from inadequate definitions towards better definitions.32 The existence of mind-independent reality forces us to correct our views every time reality reveals itself to us more. Thirdly, understanding requires that not only the human mind but also reality is organized and teleological in nature. Understanding ultimately means seeing how things are placed in the world, and what are its necessary and contingent features. Thus, semantic relationships and truth conditions are always based on some metaphysical view of the nature of reality that directs us to understand things in a way that correlates with metaphysical commitments. MacIntyre also distinguishes between truth and warranted assertabil29 30 31 32 MacIntyre, “First Principles,” 177; “Philosophy Recalled to Its Tasks,” 204. E.g., Scott R. Smith, Virtue Ethics and Moral Knowledge: Philosophy of Language after MacIntyre and Hauerwas (Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2003). MacIntyre, “Moral Relativism”; “Philosophy Recalled,” 185. See also Mats Wahlberg, “Faith, Realism, and Universal Reason: MacIntyrean Reflections on Fides et Ratio,” Nova et Vetera (English) 16, no. 4 (2018): 1313–36. See, e.g., MacIntyre, “Moral Relativism”; “Philosophy Recalled,” 184–92; “Truth as Good,” 198–13. See also Bretherton, Hospitality as Holiness, 21. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality 325 ity.33 If something is true, it is true for everyone and at all times. Because this is quite a high ideal, truth and rationality do not always fall into one category. In other words, it is not pragmatically wise to say that it is rational to believe only those things that are known to be true.34 On the other hand, the condition of rationality is warranted assertability. If we have good reasons to assert something, it also makes sense to believe it. Nevertheless, we must constantly strive towards not only good arguments but also the truth. It follows from all this that knowledge acquisition is approached through personal characteristics and not only through the analysis of propositions and their truth conditions. In order for our knowledge to grow, the right habitus is needed that combines the right goal with the right kind of action. This involves the unity of moral and intellectual virtues and also the interconnectedness of all knowledge.35 A key feature of MacIntyre’s thinking is the holistic attitude of the role of philosophy in both the academy and society. Philosophy is not just about tinkering with professional fringe issues that seem absurd in the eyes of ordinary people. The academic discipline of philosophy must be linked to the kind of questions that ordinary people ask. A philosophy that cannot incorporate this into its own role is in danger of becoming superfluous. Secondly, philosophy must be able to do justice to the phenomenological reality of the everyday world without reducing itself to a position that no longer has any deeper questions to ask.36 It is clear, however, that over time the Thomists have held beliefs that have subsequently turned out to be wrong, and MacIntyre openly admits this. But in Thomism the essential commitment is not to the conclusions, but to the way of thinking. Not all beliefs that are held by Thomists are necessarily true, but if they come to embrace some other belief, it is made possible precisely by Thomism as a method. A distinction must therefore be made between the method and the results achieved through it. MacIntyre thinks there are only two options aside from Thomism: Enlightenment and postmodernism. Both are performatively impossible. Enlightenment is unable to learn new things or to do justice to particular 33 34 35 36 MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 363; Alasdair MacIntyre, “A Partial Response to My Critics,” in After MacIntyre: Critical Perspectives on the Work of Alasdair MacIntyre, ed. John Horton and Susan Mendus (Cambridge: Polity, 1994), 187. A similar epistemic strategy has been suggested by, e.g., Robert Audi, Rationality and Religious Commitment (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). MacIntyre, “Philosophy Recalled,” 186. MacIntyre, “Philosophy Recalled,” 180–84. 326 Olli-Pekka Vainio situations. Postmodernism, on the other hand, is unable to justify itself and falls into internal conflict from the very beginning. Only a teleological interpretation of reality can justify the growth in knowledge and truth, while at the same time doing justice to particular contexts of knowledge. At this stage, it is possible to respond to challenges (1) and (2) that were mentioned earlier. First, MacIntyre does not seek to provide a way beyond the traditions to resolve disputes between traditions because the key factor in epistemological crises is that the tradition itself discovers how its own explanatory power disappears in epistemological crises. In other words, tradition itself fails on its own terms.37 Secondly, the relationship between transparency and teleology, as MacIntyre understands them, emerges from his phenomenological analysis, which describes how human reasoning works anyway. In practice, we have no other way of reasoning than the one which is more accurately described by Thomism. Tradition and Change The third criticism (3) concerns MacIntyre’s way of interpreting existing Thomist or quasi-Thomistic traditions. According to the critics, MacIntyre’s model requires the liberalization and relaxation of the core commitments of given traditions. According to Ian Markham, MacIntyre’s commitment to some partisan tradition, and a critical inquiry that emerges from this, may not fit together.38 In other words, MacIntyre’s preference for a tradition-based rationality requires acceptance at least of some Enlightenment ideals. The most important of these are probably the critical distance of one’s own beliefs and the importance of education.39 Does MacIntyre’s model actually require the traditions to be liberalized, that is, as Markham says, to embrace the ideals of the Enlightenment so 37 38 39 Bretherton explains well the epistemological crisis theory from this very point of view (Hospitality as Holiness, 28–30). Ian Markham, “Faith and Reason: Reflections of MacIntyre’s ‘TraditionConstituted Enquiry,’” Religious Studies 27, no. 2 (1991): 259–67. MacIntyre writes : “We will not however be able to and be what that which we are thereby committed to do and be, unless we have been able to become disinterested, that is, to distance ourselves from those particular material and psychological interests that are always apt to find expression in those partialities and prejudices that are nourished by our desires for pleasure, money and power” (“Aquinas and the Extent of Moral Disagreement,” in Selected Essays, vol. 2, Ethics and Politics [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006], 78). It is noteworthy that MacIntyre does not claim that we should distance ourselves from our traditions, but from different selfish requests and prejudices. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality 327 that they can fulfill the virtues that MacIntyre wants to favor? MacIntyre would deny this claim. For example, Aquinas’s Summa theologiae is in itself an example of dialogue and the ability to absorb the elements of other traditions.40 As has already been said, although Aquinas was wrong about some things, it is his method that allows the change and progress to take place. According to MacIntyre, it would be a mistake to regard openness to criticism as a characteristic of the Enlightenment alone.41 In addition, MacIntyre nowhere claims that all communities and narratives are equally good or that a virtuous attitude towards one’s own beliefs will somehow arise by itself or automatically.42 From MacIntyre’s point of view, the problem of a fundamentalist community, for example, would be that it judges the world only from the perspective of its own experience and is imprisoned by it. That is why the world categorically becomes structured by “us” and “them,” which is, of course, a great breeding ground for hatred rather than mutual dialogue. In such a situation, however, it is not a benefit to say to fundamentalists that their views are irrational, intolerant, and immoral. Instead (according to MacIntyre’s point of view), they should take advantage of the resources of their own traditions, which can expand their perspective from within.43 This, on the other hand, requires the study of a new “language,” which in practice implies the ability to set oneself within a foreign tradition and to understand it from within. However, MacIntyre’s assessment of the current situation is bleak. Disagreements between different traditions show no signs of resolution.44 In the event of a dispute, each party presents its own views and the reasons for them, as well as responds to the challenges of foreign traditions in a way that meets only the requirements of its own tradition. However, there 40 41 42 43 44 MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions, 127. Markham argues that critical attitudes and transparency were made possible by shattering the ecclesiastic power structure after the Enlightenment (“Faith and Reason,” 264). However, Markham acknowledges that this is only a partial reason, and this softens the blow of his criticism. Of course, an open inquiry (or something that at least seems like it) is easier in the post-Enlightenment cultural state. But this does not mean that the Enlightenment invented critical thinking or dialogue. MacIntyre thinks that it is modern liberalism that is the main example of a tradition that is stuck in place. Contrary to what one would expect, MacIntyre claims that our culture is precisely the culture of answers, not questions: we are offered different responses, both liberal and conservative, both secular and religious, which are designed to stop us asking further questions (“First Principles,” 182). MacIntyre, Ethics in the Conflict of Modernity, 312. MacIntyre, God, Philosophy, Universities, 176. 328 Olli-Pekka Vainio is a lack of enquiry that would look for and articulate criteria that could be understandable from the point of view of a competing tradition. The applicability of MacIntyre’s vision depends directly on whether the real virtues can flourish. According to MacIntyre, the practicing of intellectual virtues should allow a person to think and make individual judgments, while at the same time being conscious of dependence on others. This is conditional on participation in social relations, which involve reciprocal sharing, giving, and receiving in a way that reflects the ideals of natural moral law.45 Although, according to MacIntyre, this kind of attitude to the world is natural, various factors can quite effectively prevent it from being realized. These include the perverse will of individuals, as well as institutions and ideologies that restrict the scope of the human experience too tightly. Additional Challenges As mentioned earlier, MacIntyre’s philosophy has moved from implicit relativism towards Thomistic realism. This has also resulted in a theological turn. MacIntyre says frankly that the theistic framework is the only coherent teleological worldview we have reason to believe in.46 Does this mean that MacIntyre’s theory has value only within a Christian theological framework? I do not think so. Thomism includes a strong emphasis on natural theology as one of its key elements,47 and there is always a common ground between different communities and traditions. According to MacIntyre, this policy means that the representatives of different traditions can understand what the other person says, even though they may not be able to see how a view that is opposite to theirs is justified.48 In addition, people have the resources for a third-person perspective because they are 45 46 47 48 MacIntyre, Dependent Rational Animals, 155–56. Alasdair MacIntyre, “Plain Persons and Moral Philosophy: Rules, Virtues and Goods,” in The MacIntyre Reader, ed. Kelvin Knight (London: Polity, 1998), 152: “The only type of teleologically ordered universe in which we have good reason to believe is a theistic universe. Hence, moral progress of the plain person towards her or his ultimate good is always a matter of more than morality. And the enacted narrative of that progress will only become fully intelligible when it is understood not only in terms of metaphysics but in an adequate theological light, when, that is, the particularities of that narrative are understood to embody what is said about sin and about grace in the IaIIae of the Summa as well as what is said about law and the virtues. The moral progress of the plain person is always the beginnings of a pilgrim’s progress.” See also Bretherton, Hospitality as Holiness, 24–25. MacIntyre, Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity, 231. Bretherton, Hospitality as Holiness, 27–28. After Relativism: Alasdair MacIntyre on Tradition and Rationality 329 human, not because they are Thomists.49 Although MacIntyre’s premises strongly draw from the Christian tradition, it is dialogical and open-ended. In the end, it is an empirical question how it and the competing alternatives will succeed in this goal. Secondly, Porter asks whether MacIntyre’s model really applies to moral problems. The dialectic process he describes is easily realized in science because in this context the researcher is conversing with an empirical reality that inevitably guides him or her towards theories that always correspond with reality better. However, in terms of values, we do not seem to have such a reality in front of us that would guide us in the same direction, or at the very least, its existence is much more controversial.50 The situation is hampered by the fact that MacIntyre admits that there is nothing to guarantee that unanimity will be found.51 The Augustinian feature of MacIntyre’s thinking is reflected in his emphasis on the influence of sin in human thinking. Although the imprint of natural law is strong in us, we can still be blind to what is really good and what is not. In the latter case, we consider things like honor, property, and enjoyment as the ultimate goods. According to MacIntyre, the salient and particularly problematic feature of our modern world is the ideal of freedom of choice: everyone must be free to choose their own idea of good without acknowledging any standard outside one’s own will and self-understanding. Good is created through choices; it is not already found as an existing feature of reality.52 The interesting question is whether this possibility of disagreement deprives MacIntyre’s theory of credibility. In his essay on Aquinas’s theory of natural law and its ability to deal with the disagreement, MacIntyre admits that reality yields to a wide range of interpretations, and according to Aquinas, it is possible for a person to define a hierarchy of values in many different ways.53 Ultimately, it is precisely this possibility of creating different hierarchies that creates disagreement. However, according to 49 50 51 52 53 In evolutionary psychology, this is called “the theory of mind,” or the ability to recognize the same moods in other beings as in yourself. It is a unique human trait. See Peter Carruthers, The Architecture of the Mind (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 155–57. Porter, “Tradition,” 53–55. This same problem is already raised in Plato’s dialogue Phaedros (263a–b). MacIntyre, “Aquinas and the Extent of Moral Disagreement,” 71–72: “Continuous disagreement is a permanent condition of philosophy.” MacIntyre, “Philosophy Recalled,” 195. MacIntyre, “Aquinas and the Extent of Moral Disagreement.” See also Aquinas, Summa theologiae I–II, qq. 2–4. 330 Olli-Pekka Vainio MacIntyre, the first principles of natural law govern reasoning in each case, even in the event of disagreement.54 Truth is the purpose of all knowledge acquisition. However, this will never be completed. Therefore, different traditions should listen to each other in order to make progress possible. This, in turn, requires the continued exercise of essential intellectual and moral virtues.55 What meta-level theory, then, can combine these principles? According to MacIntyre, the N&V answer is clear, but potentially unpleasant.56 54 55 56 MacIntyre argues the first principles are known non-inferentically, they are the same for all, they are unchanging, every normal person is able to recognize them, and their knowledge can never be destroyed from the human mind (“Aquinas and the Extent of Moral Disagreement,” 65). The actual differences between persons relate to practical applications made of these principles. MacIntyre, “Aquinas and the Extent of Moral Disagreement,” 76–80; Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity, 314. A previous Finnish version of this article has been published in Teologinen Aikakauskirja 5–6 (2014): 443–53. The English version is published with permission. Nova et Vetera, English Edition, Vol. 20, No. 1 (2022): 331–364 331 Book Reviews Thomas Aquinas on the Immateriality of the Human Intellect by Adam Wood (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2020), xi + 318 pp. This is the first book-length discussion of Aquinas’s conclusion that the human intellect is immaterial. Its main purpose is to interpret that conclusion, and to interpret and assess the arguments Aquinas offers in support of it. Of the many arguments Aquinas presents, three receive lengthy consideration. The first of these, originally Aristotle’s, is based on the human intellect’s ability to grasp all corporeal natures; the second, traceable to Avicenna, is based on the human intellect’s ability to reflect on itself; the third is based on the fact that the human intellect understands things in a universal mode. According to Adam Wood’s assessments of these arguments, the first most likely fails; it equivocates on what it means to “receive forms,” and thus wrongly assumes that the “intentional presence of forms in cognizers requires their literal absence” (210). The second similarly equivocates on “self-reflexivity.” The third, at least as Aquinas expresses it and as commentators usually understand it, is guilty of what Robert Pasnau calls the “Content Fallacy,” as when one tries to infer, given that Bob is thinking about red cars, that Bob’s thoughts are red. Nonetheless, Wood is cautiously optimistic that a certain argument put forward by some thinkers today, and resembling Aquinas’s second attempt, is sound, although he is uncertain that it could stand as an interpretation of Aquinas’s own argument. Similarly, he proposes that a certain argument advanced by Elizabeth Anscombe, Thomas Nagel, James Ross, and others succeeds in showing that the intellect is immaterial, and that it might be a way to interpret Aquinas’s third argument. For a book focused on so difficult and disputed a matter as the immateriality of intellect, and amassing and correlating so large a number of scholarly interpretations and evaluations of Aquinas’s thought on the subject, its style is remarkably lucid, its logic easy to follow. Each chapter begins by describing the contents of its upcoming sections and the rationale for their inclusion and order. There are six chapters in all; the first two discuss forms, the third presents Aquinas’s argumentation from the incorporeality of the intellect to the incorruptibility of the human soul, the fourth outlines his under- 332 Book Reviews standing of cognition, the fifth interprets and evaluates his understanding of the immateriality of intellect, and the last interprets some of Aquinas’s views concerning the separated soul. Much of the terminology in the book is not Aquinas’s own, being neither his Latin nor equivalent English. This is a consequence of a secondary purpose of the book, which is to position Aquinas’s thought “alongside recent developments in metaphysics and philosophy of mind.” Thus readers will encounter such foreigners to Aquinas’s diction as “truthmakers,” “ontology,” “emergentism,” “hylomorphism,” “tropes,” “overarching structures,” and many more. In itself, this kind of practice can be a positive service. The translatability of Aquinas’s thought into the philosophical usage of other traditions and schools, especially those of our own time, so far as that is possible without distortion, highlights its objectivity and universality, and makes it accessible to those unaccustomed to its native vocabulary. (Aquinas himself “translated” the thought of Pseudo-Dionysius into his own philosophical terminology.) As to the quality of the book’s philosophical content, one may consider its originality, its captivating power, and above all, its truth. As to originality, the book as a whole is novel in the sense that it is the first book-length discussion of the subject, as noted. Its content is largely not new, however, though newly brought together; Wood admits he frequently relies on the work of others in order to support his own interpretations and conclusions. Still, the orderly and readable gathering of many arguments from the relevant secondary literature is itself a contribution, and a number of positions and arguments in the book are in fact Wood’s own. Certainly the book is engaging, even provocative. No one interested in Aquinas’s philosophy of the human soul, or in his thought in general, could possibly find it a bore. Nor is that merely a function of the controversial nature of the matter; the writing is engaging, and the author’s positions and argumentation, as well as his discussions of other commentators, are apt to rouse wonder about a great many things. The criterion of truth is likely to be the greatest sticking point for some readers—naturally enough, since there is hardly an uncontroversial statement in the book, as its author is well aware. One example of such reasonable doubt regards Wood’s interpretation of Aquinas’s understanding of knowing. According to Wood, “cognition can be understood in terms of information encoding” (208), and Aquinas himself “thinks of cognition as a sort of information processing” (152). This theory of knowing is not without its supporters, of course, nor is it without reason that many commentators hold it and read Aquinas himself as a subscriber to it. This interpretation, nonetheless, is not the whole truth Book Reviews 333 about Aquinas’s understanding of what it means to know, and does not appear to be wholly true to his understanding. For Aquinas, the supreme knower is God, whose knowledge would be difficult to characterize as “a sort of information processing.” The divine thought is not any sort of process or change (Summa theologiae [ST] I, q. 9, a. 1; q. 14, aa. 7 and 15). Even a human intellect, when simply grasping the nature of a thing, or seeing the truth of a self-evident statement, is not in any obvious sense processing something; the activity of the intellect is called process or movement only metaphorically (In I de anima, lec. 10), and even then refers mainly to discursive thought, not to the understanding that precedes or follows it (ST 1, q. 79, a. 8). Also, is there “information” in God, encoded or otherwise? Not if that refers to a form added to his substance by which he knows things other than himself (ST I, q. 3, a. 6; q. 14, a. 4). Though Aquinas speaks of ideas in God, these are not distinct from the divine substance, and do not in any sense inform it. One might be tempted to regard God as an exception to the general rule of what it means to know, but Aquinas concludes that God is in summo cognitionis (ST I, q. 14, a. 1) from an altogether general definition of cognoscentia meant to include God, the angels, human beings, and even irrational animals. Would Aquinas really agree with Wood, then, that knowers “become formally identical to what they cognize in the same sense that maps become formally identical to cities or compact discs become formally identical to songs written on them” (162–63)? Wood raises this interpretation’s most obvious difficulty, known as the “Liberalism Objection” (175): according to this information-encoding view of knowing, maps should know the cities of which they are maps, and compact discs should know the music of which they are recordings. Aquinas himself, though unfamiliar with compact discs, certainly knew of maps. He also knew that the colors and shapes of visible things are somehow present in transparent media intentionaliter (In II de anima, lec. 14), that is, not in such a way as to change the natural colors or shapes of those media, which sounds very much like the manner in which he says visible forms are present in beings endowed with sight. Why, then, does Aquinas not attribute knowledge to such things? Wood suggests (180) that what must be implied in or added to the information-encoding account is the final cause of cognition. Animals, for instance, have sense for the sake of prompting and directing their survival-related action, whereas a map does not represent the plan of a city for the sake of any survival-related activity it is inclined to perform, nor does a compact disc store songs for the sake of any self-benefiting activity it is to perform. This observation is both true in itself and something with which Aquinas would agree. As a way of cordoning off knowers from non-know- 334 Book Reviews ers, however, it appears unsatisfactory and foreign to Aquinas. Knowing is a certain kind of activity, differing from all other activities by itself, not only by the further activities it might originate or support in its subject. In fact, it is not knowing that should be defined by the activities and powers flowing from it, but these other activities and powers that should be distinguished and defined in part by their proceeding from knowing. Sense appetite, for example, is distinguished from natural appetite by the fact that it proceeds from sense, and will, which is intellectual appetite (ST I-II, q. 8, a. 1), is distinguished from sense appetite by the fact that it proceeds from intellect (ST I, q. 80, aa. 1 and 2). The book’s assessments of the arguments of Aquinas for the immateriality of intellect would appear to lack cogency as well. Take the argument based on universality. Part of Wood’s reason for rejecting this argument, at least as it is most readily interpreted, is that there seems to be nothing impossible about a material individual having universal representational power, as one sees in Aquinas’s own example (from De ente et essentia) of a statue of a soldier standing for all the soldiers who fought in some battle. Why, then, cannot the thought of some common nature exist in the mind not only as an individual thought, as Aquinas says, but even as a material individual, contrary to his view? If statues can be universal, why not individual brain states and events? But surely Aquinas intends the statue not as an example of something universal in the strict sense, but only as a likeness to something strictly universal, in order to illustrate how universality is not a mode of existing even for a thought, but is instead a uniformity of relation between the one thought and the many things of which it is a likeness. Had Aquinas intended the statue as an example of something perfectly universal just as the definition of triangle is universal, he would have held that the statue is in no way more like some soldiers than others, and that it included in its own representation nothing except what could be found in all the soldiers. In fact, however, the statue is “universal” only in the way that a triangle drawn in a geometrical diagram is universal—it leaves out distractingly peculiar features of certain individuals, approaching a kind of average, something typical, like a drawing of an insect in a field guide or a specimen in a laboratory. It does not, however, leave out all individualizing material conditions whatsoever. A triangle printed on a page of some edition of Euclid’s Elements is not purely and simply “what it is to be a triangle,” including nothing peculiar to that triangle; rather, it includes a special ratio of the sides, a color, a location, and many other things that naturally and necessarily follow upon the existence of “what it is to be a triangle” in an individual material recipient such as a sheet of paper. Finally, the success of Wood’s attempt to salvage this argument based Book Reviews 335 on universality is suspect. The salvaged argument seems to be an entirely new argument, not a repaired or supplemented version of Aquinas’s. The new version hinges on the “determinate” character of intellectual knowledge rather than on what Aquinas means by universality. In itself, it is certainly deserving of serious consideration, and may well be sound. But is it really what Aquinas had in mind with his argument based on universality? It seems a stretch to say so. The author himself calls this way of reading it “somewhat adventurous” (4). Despite these and other shortcomings, the book is well worth reading. It brings many lines of thought together in an illuminating and thought-provoking way, and its own interpretations and arguments, whether I am right to call them mistaken or not, are always carefully constructed, clearly presented, and instructive. N&V Michael Augros Thomas Aquinas College Northfield, MA The Bible and Catholic Ressourcement: Essays on Scripture and Theology by William M. Wright IV (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2019), xvii + 250 pp. The interpretation of Scripture in relation to the ressourcement movement is the topic of this stimulating collection of essays by William Wright, professor of theology at Duquesne University. All the chapters, except for chapter 6, were previously published as journal articles between 2006 and 2015. A helpful introduction (1–9) reviews the characteristics of the ressourcement movement and sketches the book’s contents. Wright explains that the call to “return to the sources” (Scripture, the Fathers, the liturgy) served various purposes: a recentering on Christ, the reintegration of theology and spirituality, the rediscovery of the breadth of the Tradition, and the retrieval of its wisdom in order to speak meaningfully to present concerns. The essays are organized into three parts. First, Wright dedicates three essays to “Select Ressourcement Theologians and the Bible,” namely, Henri de Lubac, Yves Congar, and Joseph Ratzinger. Wright admits that the omission of Hans Urs von Balthasar is a lacuna, which he hopes to address in the future (5n19). The second part consists of four essays that examine Gospel topics in Ratzinger’s/Benedict 336 Book Reviews XVI’s three-volume work Jesus of Nazareth, which was written in order to facilitate an encounter with Christ. In part 3, Wright turns to his area of specialty, John’s Gospel, offering three studies of specific texts that relate to the mystery of Jesus. Wright draws on Robert Sokolowski’s theology of disclosure, which provides a way to reconnect contemporary exegesis with the premodern tradition of the spiritual senses, so emphasized by de Lubac. In chapter 1, “Patristic Exegetical Theory and Practice in de Lubac and Congar” (13–25), Wright highlights de Lubac’s retrieval of the theological vision provided by the doctrine of the fourfold sense of Scripture. For de Lubac, the literal sense is about the verbal presentation of the realities or events of salvation history (littera gesta docet, according to the medieval distich), and the spiritual senses concern the biblical realities (res) themselves. Wright approvingly cites his colleague Francis Martin (a quotation repeated twice later): “The spiritual sense of Scripture is based, not on a theory of text, but on a theology of history” (17, 159, 227).1 Turning to Congar, Wright explains how Congar uses the categories of sacramental theology (sacramentum, res et sacramentum, and res tantum) to express the doctrine of the four senses. Whereas de Lubac encouraged the integration of premodern exegesis with modern biblical criticism, Congar went further by also providing some examples (the Virgin Mary; the temple). Regarding this integration, Wright notes Congar’s influence on Dei Verbum §12. In chapter 2, “The Literal Sense of Scripture according to Henri de Lubac: Insights from Patristic Exegesis of the Transfiguration” (27–57), Wright elaborates on de Lubac’s understanding of the literal sense, examining his comments on the interpretation of the Transfiguration accounts by Origen, Jerome, and Augustine. Because de Lubac’s view includes the historical realities expressed by the biblical words, it differs from typical explanations that focus on the author’s intended meaning or the meaning of the words themselves. The patristic authors interpreted the Transfiguration, in which Jesus’s humanity reveals his divinity, as a symbol for understanding the relationship between the Old and New Testaments and between the literal and spiritual senses. For example, Peter, James, and John are like those who possess spiritual understanding of Scripture. To them, Jesus’s clothes (representing the words of Scripture) become dazzling white, revealing both his divinity and the relationship of the Old Testament (Moses and Elijah) to Jesus. In contrast, Jesus’s clothes appear unchanged to the disciples who did not ascend the mountain, who are like those who perceive only the letter of Scripture. There is thus a sacramental 1 Francis Martin, “Election, Covenant, and Law,” Nova et Vetera (English) 4 (2006): 867. Book Reviews 337 quality to de Lubac’s understanding. However, Wright also points out that de Lubac leaves underdeveloped the relationship between the historical event and its biblical account, though he does affirm (with Dei Verbum §2) the intrinsic connection between them.2 Wright here could have elaborated further, such as clarifying how de Lubac’s understanding of the literal sense explains the three Synoptic accounts (having somewhat different details and intertextual phenomena) of the one Transfiguration event.3 Moreover, concerning literary genres, de Lubac’s emphasis on the historical realities is more readily understood when considering biblical narratives; but is not a greater emphasis on words rather than events necessary when interpreting passages that are didactic, prophetic, poetic, and so on?4 In chapter 3, “Echoes of Biblical Apocalyptic in the Encyclical Teaching of Benedict XVI” (59–81), Wright considers Ratzinger’s longstanding interest in eschatology (e.g., his textbook on the subject and his Habilitationsschrift on Saint Bonaventure’s response to Joachim of Fiore’s apocalypticism). Developing insights of Cyril O’Regan, Wright examines three apocalyptic themes echoed in Benedict’s three encyclicals. First, there is the analysis of the present moment as one of crisis in which the Church is engaged in a conflict with an antagonist. Second, there is the interpretation of the antagonist (e.g., “atheist humanism”) as an instantiation of the figure of the apocalyptic false prophet. Third, there is the Church’s response to the false prophet’s deception, namely, Christ-like witness of “charity-in-truth” (62). Wright concludes that Benedict indeed echoes certain themes of biblical apocalypticism, though he eschews its conventional literary form “to avoid the fanaticism with which apocalyptic is often associated” (81). This is an informative and perceptive essay, providing explanations of the Book of Revelation (and other apocalyptic texts) and illuminating some threads in Benedict’s writings, such as his references to Vladimir Soloviev’s story of the Antichrist in his Erasmus lecture and in volume 1 of Jesus of Nazareth (112). In the conclusion, Wright suggests another example of Benedict’s use of apocalyptic interpretation, 2 3 4 One of Wright’s Ph.D. students offers a gentle critique of de Lubac on this point: Kevin Storer, Reading Scripture to Hear God: Kevin Vanhoozer and Henri de Lubac on God’s Use of Scripture in the Economy of Redemption (Cambridge: James Clarke, 2015), 45–50. Later, Wright partly addresses this issue, indicating that the emphasis on the res does not downplay the “literary and rhetorical qualities” of the biblical texts (191). See William M. Wright IV and Francis Martin, Encountering the Living God in Scripture: Theological and Philosophical Principles for Interpretation (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2019), 206. 338 Book Reviews his “critique of religiously inspired violence” (81). He refers to a passage in volume 2 of Jesus of Nazareth, though Benedict’s Regensburg lecture also comes to mind. Perhaps another, more recent example would be Benedict’s 2019 essay “The Church and the Scandal of Sexual Abuse,” in which the Pope Emeritus refers to the current crisis in the Church, explains it in light of the Apocalypse (Rev 12:10), and calls on Christians to oppose the devil by their witness to truth and love in imitation of Christ. Wright continues his engagement with Benedict’s thought in part 2 (chs. 4–7). In chapter 4, “A ‘New Synthesis’: Benedict XVI’s Jesus of Nazareth: Volume 1” (85–114), Wright explains that the work is Benedict’s own attempt to achieve the “new synthesis” called for in his 1988 Erasmus lecture, combining the historical-critical method with a hermeneutic of faith that reads Scripture in the context of the canon and the Tradition (101). The result of Benedict’s synthesis is a portrayal of Jesus that is simultaneously historically sensitive to Jesus’s Jewish context and attentive to his communion with the Father. Wright concludes by noting Benedict’s pastoral purpose of helping readers deepen their relationship with Jesus. In chapter 5, “Pre-Gospel Traditions and Post-Critical Interpretation in Benedict XVI’s Jesus of Nazareth: Volume 2” (115–28), Wright carries on the discussion of Benedict’s two-level hermeneutical approach, which attempts to implement Dei Verbum §12. As a case study of this integrated approach, Wright examines Benedict’s discussion of the four Eucharistic institution narratives, noting his emphasis on both the historicity of the key events and the ecclesial reception and interpretation of those events. Chapter 6, “Living with the Word of God: The Holy Family in Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives” (129–41), exemplifies the ressourcement characteristic of integrating theology and spirituality. Wright beautifully reflects on Benedict’s interpretation of the Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph as models for believers, because of their inner relationship with God’s word and their humility and obedience in receiving it. In chapter 7, “Patristic Biblical Hermeneutics in Benedict XVI’s Jesus of Nazareth” (143–62), Wright examines Benedict’s treatment of the Good Shepherd discourse (John 10:1–18), drawing out various ways in which Benedict incorporates features of patristic hermeneutics (though he is critical of patristic methods). For example, besides principles such as the canonical, Christocentric reading discussed in earlier essays, Wright notes Benedict’s use of mimetic exegesis, in which readers are invited to consider the biblical text as a mirror in order to reflect on their own situation (152, 156, 161). Wright also compares Benedict’s understanding of the senses of Scripture, with its focus on the text, to de Lubac’s understanding of the tradition, as represented by Aquinas, with its focus on the realities Book Reviews 339 presented by the text. Wright concludes that the two models “are not irreconcilable” (160). Indeed, both models are helpful, and choosing only one tends toward oversimplification. In part 3, Wright gives us examples of his own efforts to integrate modern biblical criticism with a retrieval of patristic exegesis, especially its centering on Christ. Chapter 8, “Jesus’s Identity and the Use of Scripture in John 6:1–21” (165–84), provides an excellent analysis of the role of the walking on the sea (6:16–21) in relation to the feeding of the five thousand (6:1–15), in preparation for the Bread of Life discourse. Jesus’s revelation to his disciples—egō eimi, “I am” (6:20; cf. 8:24, 28, 58)—echoes YHWH’s self-identification (e.g., Exod 3:14; Deut 32:39; Isa 43:10). It thus corrects the crowd’s assessment in John 6:14–15: Jesus is not merely prophet or king, but “the Lord” (cf. 6:23). Hence, in multiplying the loaves, Jesus acts as God did in giving the people manna at the time of Moses. The manna and the multiplied loaves were both perishable, but they function as signs pointing to something greater, the bread of life that is Jesus himself, who gives himself in the Eucharist as food that endures to eternal life. In chapters 9 and 10, Wright skillfully deploys insights drawn from Sokolowski’s theology of disclosure, a Husserlian phenomenological approach that pays attention to the realities presented by the biblical words. In chapter 9, “The Theology of Disclosure and the Christological Interpretation of Psalm 69 in John’s Gospel” (185–205), Wright provides a case study of the Christological interpretation of the three Psalm 69 references in the Fourth Gospel (John 2:17; 15:25; 19:28–30). He concludes that “the evangelist reads Psalm 69 as anticipating or foreshadowing Jesus because the words of the Psalm describe a situation which he sees mirrored in Jesus’s life” (204–5). In chapter 10, “The Doctrine of God, the Theology of Disclosure, and the Liturgical Res in John 8:12–20” (207–27), Wright examines Jesus’s pronouncement, “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12), against the background of the Jewish feast of Sukkot (Tabernacles). During the festival, large lighted lampstands in the temple’s “Court of the Women” illuminated the city at night. It is precisely in this court (8:20) that Jesus makes his declaration. Using the theology of disclosure, Wright explains that the reality of the Sukkot liturgy, presented in manifold Old Testament texts (and in the Mishnah), gives Jesus “the context and terms for his disclosure, and Jesus in turn reveals previously unseen dimensions” of the feast (226). In traditional language, the Sukkot liturgy described by the biblical words (verba/signa) is a res significans pointing to the res of Jesus. Wright thus concludes by recalling Aquinas’s definition (Summa Theologiae I, q. 1, a. 10) of the spiritual sense as the Christological signification of the things 340 Book Reviews signified by the words of Scripture. He also returns to de Lubac’s emphasis that the spiritual sense is found not in the text itself but in the realities described by the text (227; cf. 192n36). Wright thus leads the reader full circle, returning in a new light to the ressourcement concerns discussed at the book’s beginning. In summary, Wright’s collection of essays is highly recommended reading for all those seeking to understand what an integrated hermeneutical approach actually looks like in practice. This reviewer thus plans to make use of these essays in his own teaching. Earlier in the book, Wright had said, “much work remains to be done toward the synthesizing of modern biblical criticism with the Ressourcement of patristic exegesis” (25). Through these essays, he has himself made a significant contribution N&V toward that synthesis. Pablo T. Gadenz Mount St. Mary’s Seminary Emmitsburg, MD Aesthetics by Dietrich von Hildebrand, vol. 1, trans. Brian McNeil, ed. John F. Crosby (Steubenville, OH: The Hildebrand Project, 2016), xxxvii + 470 pp. Aesthetics by Dietrich von Hildebrand, vol. 2, trans. John F. Crosby, John Henry Crosby, and Brian McNeil, ed. John F. Crosby and John Henry Crosby (Steubenville, OH: The Hildebrand Project, 2018), xxxi + 574 pp. The Hildebrand Project, dedicated, in its words, “to the presentation and exploration of the thought and witness of Dietrich von Hildebrand,” continues its good work by its gift to the English-speaking world of original translations of von Hildebrand’s two-volume Aesthetics. For the English-speaking reader who has studied the works by von Hildebrand previously available in English (on topics ranging from value to affectivity to liturgy), these volumes on beauty are an indispensable completion of the whole. For readers new to von Hildebrand, they present an excellent introduction. I set out to do two things in this review. First, I present the general architecture of the work, and point out some areas that are especially rewarding for their broader philosophical implications. I can do little justice to the work in this respect, given its great length. Second, as an outsider to the Book Reviews 341 world of aesthetics, I raise some questions that I hope will spur scholars interested in beauty (and von Hildebrand’s corpus) to read this work and contribute to a lively secondary literature in the years to come. I. Volume 1 begins by arguing for the objectivity of beauty (ch. 1). Beauty and the aesthetic values that do not fall under beauty are objective values, the knowledge of which isperceptual. Our apprehension of values is thus intentional (or frontal in von Hildebrand’s terminology), immediate, and intuitive. Many of the details of the perception of beauty and other aesthetic values will be familiar to readers of von Hildebrand’s other works, as are the arguments for the objectivity of values. But what is noteworthy about this chapter, and what makes it a special treasure for the student of von Hildebrand, is its inclusion of sustained treatments of other philosophers. Given the relative paucity of footnotes and critical discussion of other philosophers in his corpus, the opening of Aesthetics provides a muchneeded contextualization of von Hildebrand, from the pen of the author himself. David Hume, William James, George Santayana, Baruch Spinoza, W. D. Ross, G. E. Moore—all are presented and dispatched by von Hildebrand in the opening salvo. For those readers of Thomas Aquinas who still cast a wary eye over the work of von Hildebrand, there is further fuel for the fire in his critique of the appetitus theory of beauty (1:30–34) and Jacques Maritain’s treatment of beauty as a transcendental property of being (1:89–93, 266). Following his defense of aesthetic objectivity, von Hildebrand distinguishes between metaphysical beauty (ch. 3) and the beauty of the audible and visible (ch. 4) and describes the relation between these kinds of beauty (ch. 5). Already in chapter 5, there is the indication of broader phenomenological insights to come. The expression of non-aesthetic (e.g., moral) values in the human face provides the reader with a concrete instance of the “mystery” of expression: how is it that metaphysical beauty (the “irradiation” of other values) (1:87)—which is itself invisible—gets expressed by that which is visible (form, color, and materials)? Of further interest is the distinction between visible beauty and expressed metaphysical beauty—for these, says von Hildebrand, can come apart. A human face may be beautiful on account of its form—yet lose its full beauty if it “looks emphatically stupid and narrow, or evil, cold, and heartless” (1:138). A human face may be visibly ugly, but “fascinate through its expression of kindness, love, and humility” (ibid.). In both cases, the face is not beautiful in the “full sense” (lacking either visible beauty or expressed metaphysical beauty). 342 Book Reviews Building upon the discussion of chapter 5, von Hildebrand next presents what he declares to be the central puzzle of aesthetics (ch. 6). How is it that the beauty of some objects surpasses the ontological “rank” or “dignity” of said objects? A particular waterfall, for example, ranks pretty low ontologically, yet it bears a beauty that far outstrips its ontological rank. Von Hildebrand’s solution (sketched in ch. 6 and developed in chs. 9–11) is his distinction between beauty of the first power (which appeals to the senses) and beauty of the second power (the lofty spiritual beauty that transcends the ontological rank and qualitative values of the object) (1:152). The road to this distinction is a masterpiece of negative phenomenology. Von Hildebrand carefully rules out what beauty of the second power is not. It is neither grounded in the physical features of the object, nor is it the expression of other values inherent in the object. Rather, beauty of the second power “speaks of something completely different, something higher, . . . the world of higher goods and their values, . . . the whole world of values which surrounds us, rising up to the infinite beauty of God” (1:212–13). Beautiful objects, however lowly they may be, afford us access to “immaterial and higher realities” and thus present to us a beauty that is not really their own (1:212–14). If I have focused long upon the first half of volume 1, it is because even if von Hildebrand had stopped writing here, his place in aesthetics would have been assured. Already, in his lengthy defense of the objective reality of beauty, he has done a great service to the restoration of beauty. In his articulation of the expressiveness of the human face, and the distinction between beauty of the first and second power, he crystallizes the central aesthetic experience: the ways in which the encounter with beauty is transcendent, carrying us far beyond the visible to something higher. As it is, von Hildebrand has far more to say. He continues by presenting three antitheses to beauty (ch. 12): ugliness, triviality, and boringness— none of which lack for examples today. Yet one of von Hildebrand’s unexpected examples—the toad—illustrates yet another way in which his Aesthetics has far-reaching metaphysical implications. Not just by defect of form, but by the form itself, may a thing be ugly. Toads are ugly—and so a metaphysical theory of beauty (as a transcendental) and ugliness (as privation) supposedly falls. The first volume is rounded out by describing the thematic bearers of beauty (in nature and in human life [ch. 14–15]), before turning to the aesthetic experience itself (ch. 16). Here again, we see the phenomenologist’s mastery of distinction: being pleased, being affected, apprehending a value, responding to a value, and Book Reviews 343 forming a judgment about value—all differentiated and described prior to the situation of aesthetic value perception within value perception simpliciter and the ways in which a person may be blind to beauty and other aesthetic values (a point I return to below).1 Volume 2 begins with the ontology of artworks. Artworks are described as “quasi-substances” which stand on their own, have a deeper level of being (than accidents), and stand out from surrounding things (2:6–7). Artworks are true individuals, capable of reproduction only into mere copies, unlike the inventions of the human mind that are destined for mass replication (2:8). Artworks are also distinguished from projections of the artist (ch. 2). While artworks presuppose an artist and usually (though not necessarily) bear his stylistic marks, “the theme of a work of art is not the person of its creator, but its own value, the beauty of the work of art itself. A work of art does not primarily make a proclamation about its author, but about the glory of the cosmos and, ultimately, about God’s ultimate beauty” (2:14). In this context, there is a nice reference back to the central problem of aesthetics: for not only can (e.g.) a waterfall afford us access to lofty spiritual beauty, but a human artist may “create works of a sublimity that far transcends what he as a human being accomplishes in a moral respect” (2:14). From here, von Hildebrand turns to the wrongful attitudes to art (favoring something for its fame, fashion, or familiarity, or else regarding it un-thematically, e.g., looking at a painting that depicts a battle for its historical content and not its beauty) (2:17–23), before describing combinations between different arts (how different art forms work together to produce new unities) (ch. 4) and the claims to greatness and depth made by artworks (ch. 5). This discussion is particularly fascinating for its proposal of a norm by which to judge artworks—by reference to their intrinsic aspirations. While there is value in high, yet unmet, aspirations, there is also value in the fit between intended and fulfilled depth or greatness (2:41). For the remainder of volume 2, we are plunged into detailed descriptions of different art forms: architecture, painting, sculpture, literature, and music. In all these chapters, von Hildebrand aims not at an analysis of what makes something beautiful, for artistry is irreducible to rule-following. Beauty is grounded, creatively, in the genius of the artist at work. Rather, he supplies his reader with reasons in virtue of which an artwork fails to be beautiful (2:54). 1 He also describes two aesthetic values that are not species of beauty (elegance, the comical), before concluding with discussion of the relation of beauty to truth, love, and morality. 344 Book Reviews Of broader philosophical interest in the second half of volume 2 are phenomenological treatments of representation and transposition. In chapter 20, von Hildebrand distinguishes the representation-relation from adjacent relations of similarity, exemplar-image, copies, and replicas. Transposition is given its most sustained treatment in chapter 32, which describes the artistic transposition of figures in literary works of art. Take the case of a morally evil person (who is thereby metaphysically ugly). Somehow, observes von Hildebrand, such a person, in and through his “transposition and incorporation” into the artwork “becomes the bearer of magnificent artistic beauty” (2:344). While the evil person does not cease, in reality, to be evil (and metaphysically ugly), nevertheless the depiction of the evil and metaphysically ugly person contributes to the aesthetic value of the whole. By contrast with our response to an evil person in real life (indignation, disgust), our response to works containing depictions of evil persons (real or imagined) may be one of delight (2:345). II. Such is my condensation of over one thousand pages of text. On a crass materialistic note, it is hard not to wax critical when so many philosophical claims are made. With respect to volume 2, I will shy away from criticism. Commenting on the confidence with which von Hildebrand asserts comparative aesthetic judgments, Robert Wood writes in his preface: “What would it take to challenge that?” (2:xxiii). What would it take, indeed—though one might ask: where lies the burden of proof? I will make bold, though, to advance two critical questions that pertain to claims made in volume 1. Von Hildebrand clearly thinks that we should not moralize the aesthetic. After all, they are separate domains of value (1:75–76). In illustration of this commitment, and discussing an example of the tournaments that are bearers of beauty in human life, he writes: Bullfights have a definitely aesthetic quality of a positive kind. Despite all the cruelty to the bull and the danger to the bullfighter, the whole event has its own beauty and poetry in its style, in the beauty of the garments, the horses, the bull, the gracefulness of the bullfighter, and his courage. (1:352) Just above this passage, speaking of tournaments in general, von Hildebrand maintains their aesthetic value, despite these events being morally impermissible (1:352). Fast-forward to the discussion of the comical (ch. 19). Here one finds von Hildebrand at his most relaxed when it comes to moralizing the Book Reviews 345 aesthetic. Perhaps this is unsurprising, given that comedy is often the point at which persons are less willing to countenance aesthetic value when the content seems to breach moral norms. But given that von Hildebrand’s treatment of the comic is preceded by an admission of the aesthetic value of gory bullfights and lethal tournaments, I wonder whether, by his own stated aims, von Hildebrand is at liberty to moralize the comic under the rubric of “indecency” (1:428–29). Whether indecency is allowed by von Hildebrand to instantiate the comical is restricted by explicitly moral considerations, including whether the “source material” for the joke is sinful (1:429). Hence my question: how can inferences from moral impermissibility in the case of a bullfight (or similar entertainment), which involves loss of life and animal cruelty, to its aesthetic disvalue be blocked, but similar inferences, from the moral impermissibility (or impropriety) of a joke, to its aesthetic disvalue, be licensed? My second concern pertains to the epistemology of some of von Hildebrand’s claims. Quite frankly, I worry that phenomenologists (especially of realist stripe) sometimes lean too heavily on the “givenness” of their claims. I worry that von Hildebrand conflates the desire for explanation or argument with reductionism. Whatever the lamentable effects of the latter, the former is a staple of philosophical thought and often quite necessary to compel rational agreement between author and reader. I want to illustrate where I think the inverse relation of asserted-givenness and absence of argument is most pronounced and recurring. Consider the following text: Let us now put the unprejudiced question: what do we mean when we speak of the joyfulness of the sky? What is intuitively, immediately, given to us when we look at the blue sky? Naturally,we do not mean that the sky “feels” joy. We refer only to a pure quality that also characterizes the human reaction of joy over something, but that does not only occur as a consciously “felt” joy. There exists a quality of joyfulness that indeed occurs primarily in the personal act of joy. . . . But there also exists an objective quality of joyfulness that does not exist as consciously lived but is a quality that occurs only in some objects as a characteristic of those objects (1:181–82). So “objective” joyfulness is a “pure quality” that some objects instantiate. (Which ones? Fortunately, the answer to that question is intuitively, immediately, given as well.) Possible explanations of the “pure quality” view as involving analogy, projection, or personification are ruled out (1:182– 185). Nor is this passage an isolated curiosity. The view recurs at least two more times (1:277, 298). In the latter place, such “pure” qualities are 346 Book Reviews described with the equally unhelpful (and equally conversation-stopping) “primordial.” Nor is joyfulness the only such objective, pure, primordial quality: Like joyfulness, hopefulness naturally exists as a pure quality. It would be utter nonsense to say that nature is full of feelings of hope; to project an experienced, conscious hope into the apersonal world, into the life of apersonal nature, would be a pantheistic absurdity. Nevertheless, the quality that lives in the experienced and consciously lived hope of the human person belongs as a pure quality also to the morning in the literal sense. (1:300, emphasis added) Similar, though less implausible, remarks are also made about the objective boringness of certain works (1:278). What can be made of this? Metaphysically, the sense of “pure quality” is obscure. Epistemically, “primordial” seems to function as a bit of hand-waving. So what is the problem? In his criticism of William James’s theory of emotion, von Hildebrand writes: It would be more interesting to clear up the psychological problem of how it was possible for such a stimulating and many-sided thinker as William James—to whom we owe the fine aphorism I see what I see, whereby he refused to acquiesce in a discussion of theories that would eliminate facts—to succumb to such a primitive error that so crudely violates the principle I see what I see. (1:24, emphasis original) The problem with “I see what I see” is that it applies to everybody— everybody sees what they see. But note that James supposedly violates this principle2 and the sought-after explanation is psychological in nature. Psychology indeed—for persons who do not perceive beauty are like those born blind. They lack an ability (1:372) or organ (1:374) with which to see beauty. More broadly (and bracketing the case of a totally beauty-blind person), von Hildebrand claims that any apprehension of beauty requires a “special sense,” which admits of gradation depending on the breadth and depth of a person’s apprehension of beauty, and whether he has (or has not) artistic sensitivities (both generically and for specific genre) (1:373). 2 How? By not seeing what he (James) sees? By ignoring what he (James) sees? By ignoring what he (von Hildebrand) sees? By not seeing what he (von Hildebrand) sees? Book Reviews 347 So, if you fail to see the objective joyfulness of the blue sky, does that entail deficiency or absence of a faculty? Perhaps all that is entailed is that if you understand what a “pure quality” is, and you do not perceive the objective joyfulness, then you are lacking the special sense, or some refinement thereof. But imagine a person who otherwise agrees with the aesthetic judgments expressed by von Hildebrand. Let us stipulate that his agreement is based upon original experience and not merely von Hildebrand’s authority. But he disagrees with the claims about objective joyfulness or hopefulness. Would we say of such a person that he lacked a (sufficiently) refined sensitivity? I submit that we would not, and moreover that, in such a case, any quick dismissal of concerns about peer-disagreement rings hollow. Let me add that, if I have allowed myself the right to critique some aspects of the Aesthetics as an avowed non-aesthetician, it is on account of two reasons. The first is that the Aesthetics spills over in all directions— bearing implications for, or commenting upon, issues of method, metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. It is far from being a work exclusively for insiders. The second is that I sincerely love the work of von Hildebrand. I want to understand it better, and these questions are a means to that end. Let me close by expressing again my gratitude to the Hildebrand Project and all responsible for these volumes, and my hope that the availability of this work will bear much fruit in the scholarly and cultural restoration N&V of beauty. Joseph Gamache Marian University Indianapolis, IN On Purpose by Michael Ruse (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2018), xv+294 pp. Darwin is widely thought to have completed the expulsion of final causes from nature that began with Bacon and Descartes. The success of evolutionary biology as an explanatory framework has not given Darwinians much pause to reconsider that judgment, yet talk of teleology refuses to disappear. It persists not only in traditionally philosophical questions like consciousness and morality, but in empirical problems like evolutionary “progress” and in the very grammar of adaptation itself. Michael Ruse has attempted a selective reconstruction of 348 Book Reviews discourse on teleology from Plato to the present. With eight chapters (just over 150 pages) devoted to this history, the coverage is broad and moves at a brisk pace. The last four chapters isolate key themes in connection with teleology: human evolution, mind, religion, and the philosophical coherence of Darwinism Ruse presents a familiar historical arc. The Greek atomists were moving in the right direction until Plato, Aristotle, and their Christian inheritors steered Western philosophy onto the byway of teleological thinking, where it remained for two millennia. Modern mechanistic physics recovered course, relegating teleology to the initial design of the universe, but biology remained troublesome, and Kant was not alone when he mused that never would there appear “a Newton of a blade of grass.” But Darwin did just that, providing a mechanistic explanation for the functionality of organisms which seemed to demand final causality, and Darwinism has continually refined and extended his mechanisms. Despite attempts to recover teleology, whether theistic or vitalistic, Darwinism seems to have won the day. Nearly everyone with some knowledge of Western intellectual history knows this story, and Ruse tells it with unfailing generosity and humor, though not without a splash of gentle irony. The very forces Augustine saw as clouding God’s purposes in nature and history—the struggle for existence, self-interest, suffering—turn out to be the means by which all those apparently teleological (“good”) features of nature come into existence. Readers may frequently desire more detailed exposition, but the analysis is never careless, and Ruse has an eye for sparkling quotations that move the narrative along quickly and without caricature. The book’s most ambivalent feature is also its characteristic one, the use of a threefold typology dividing theories of teleology according to the origin of the telos: external to nature, internal to nature, and internal to the mind or heuristic, for which Plato, Aristotle, and Kant respectively stand in as author and archetype. Now these distinctions are philosophically substantive, but in Ruse’s account, they create some strange bedfellows, wrinkle the history a bit much, and cover over a number of other philosophical issues. If Plato and the Intelligent Design crowd end up together, or Kant with Darwin, that will be hard enough to swallow, but to couple Aristotle with a list of thinkers that includes philosophers like Friedrich Schelling, Herbert Spencer, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Henri Bergson, and Alfred North Whitehead, biologists like Hans Driesch and Brian Goodwin, and even the Gaia hypothesis, simply will not do. If we consider some other possible ways of organizing this history, the reasons why become evident. Book Reviews 349 One route would be to foreground the goal rather than the origin of the telos, placing four teloi in tension: a domain of ultimate values, such as beatitude or moral or logical truth, which are the end of human action and cosmic order; terminal capacities, such as reason or mind, that mark a predetermined or progressive end point for biological evolution; the adaptive utility of morphological change; and the ontogenetic course of organic development. If teleology is (minimally) goal-directed behavior, these are very different goals, different behaviors. Ruse confronts all of them at some point in the book but is preoccupied with the middle two forms, evolutionary progress and adaptation, and only rarely does he pause to discriminate the precise structure of teleology in one or another instance. Had he done so, Aristotle and Julian Huxley could scarcely end up in the same camp, for Aristotle concerned himself principally with what today we call development, Huxley with the cosmic whole of evolution. That Ruse emphasizes the “global” or cosmic element in Aristotle’s teleology, referenced to the Unmoved Mover, and does so with minimal attention to his theory of substance is telling (12–13, 16–17). Aristotle hammered out the idea of final causes to cope with the insufficiencies of atomism and Platonism in describing the growth and structure of organisms, but the logic of his argument is here glossed at best. Something similar goes for Kant and Darwin. To say that teleological thinking arises from “dispositions” that “have been put in place by natural selection for their utility” or “filled in, as it were, by experience and culture” rather than being “synthetic a priori conditions . . . for all and any rationality” ignores what Kant was after on at least two counts (212). First, Kant, like Aristotle, was interested in what he perceived to be the structure of living organisms, the reciprocal relation of parts and wholes as both mutually means and ends (58–59). That he contemplated the possibility of extending this question to what Darwin later recognized as adaptation does not absorb or vanquish it (67). The twin facts of organic form and its alteration are quite distinct issues, philosophically and teleologically. Ruse seems to miss this point, or at least neglects it here. Just as important, Kant’s a priori employment of teleology as a regulative ideal will not bend to Darwinian appropriation without a category error. Even granting Kant’s formalism, its framing is ineradicably normative, appealing to criterion of validity or rightness that are immune to Darwinian explanation. The internal logic of such questions simply has nothing to do with the mechanisms of selection. So Aristotle and Kant both seem to have the same telos in mind, that of organic development. Incidentally, though Darwin is more or less mute here, one might argue that contemporary evolutionary theory is busy 350 Book Reviews reconstructing the whole neo-Darwinian synthesis on precisely this basis (so-called “evo-devo”), and Ruse is curiously quiet about the current state of the field. A lot has happened since Stephen J. Gould. In any case, Kant and Aristotle are divided on a more fundamental level, namely, the antinomies that organize their interpretations of nature. Rather than starting with the origin or goal of teleology, we might emphasize the conceptual strategies within which any talk of teleology is taken up. Atomism is the most ancient and the most modern. If by this we mean the conceptual game of dividing nature into its smallest possible units, defining their properties, and explaining the movement of all nature from there, most of the pre-Socratics (not just Democritus or Empedocles) played along, and this strategy is constitutive of modern science. The other two strategies are harder to name, but their distinctive starting points are sufficiently plain. Plato and Aristotle, and for that matter the theistic traditions that followed them, began with the antinomy of form and matter. Post-Cartesian and especially post-Kantian philosophy departed from the antimony of mind and matter. One is tempted to term at least one of these “idealism,” but that gets confusing for obvious reasons, and we can put the issue aside here. Point being, these conceptual strategies operate at such a fundamental level that talk about the origin or the goal of teleology has to be pre-fitted to one of them, since teleology makes sense only within the context of some more specific question concerning the structures and behavior of natural phenomena. Such strategies need not be mutually exclusive. Aristotle critiqued atomism—the inductive path to final causes is founded in this critique—but he knew well enough that the organization of parts in any living thing is crucial to its functioning. They are just ontologically posterior to its substance. Leibniz was a panpsychist of sorts, but an atomist too, as was Whitehead. And some recent Thomists, like Mariusz Tabaczek, are incorporating emergence with hylomorphism. These distinctions get blunted by Ruse’s “trichotomy,” or submerged to the point of silence. It matters quite a lot that Aristotle’s whole theory of teleology started with a certain inductive problem, that of form, whereas post-Kantian theories tended to start from that of consciousness. By contrast, every advance of Darwinism has amounted to an upgrading of atomism: genetics, molecular biology, and neuroscience all give us more refined “atoms” that extend the theory’s reach. But all of the “vitalist” hitches in evolutionary theory—and there are quite a few, from Theodosius Dobzhansky and Sewall Wright to Goodwin and Harold Morowitz—tend to take development, morphology, or consciousness as a touchstone. Morphology and development get short shrift in Ruse’s telling, but mind forms a kind Book Reviews 351 of nexus for the later philosophical chapters of the book, a middle term between human evolution and religion. The chapter on religion is the weakest, although the author has written thoughtfully on the topic elsewhere and widely enough that religious readers can forgive the appearance of hasty treatment. Ruse mostly gestures towards arguments against religious views of purpose at the personal and cosmic level, pointing to contradictions between and within religions, some evolutionary candidates for explanation (Scott Atran’s hyperactive “agency detectors”) or sociological ones (Émile Durkheim), and then some rather anecdotal remarks on the goodness of secular cultures and the rancor of certain religious ones. Similarly goes the chapter on human evolution, where the target is theories of evolutionary progress that Ruse tries to head off throughout the book. The logic here is slightly clumsy, but Ruse rehearses a recognizable selectionist argument, backing up from intelligence to brain size, dietary prerequisites, problem-solving in hunting, sociality, and the like. The path to human beings was sensible, if haphazard. But if recent work on convergent evolution is right (consider Simon Conway Morris and George McGhee here), then all of these seemingly incidental variables are stirring much farther down and more widely across the phylogenetic tree than Ruse lets on. As for the relative adaptive value of logic and morality, we might, he suggests, just as well conclude with a “warthog Aristotle” that “big brains and intelligence are not good adaptations” (164). Are wallowing in the mud and vigorous procreation really equally good to a reflective moral life, all things considered? I suspect category errors and performative contradictions lurk behind such assertions. The chapter on mind is more thorough but surprisingly noncommittal. Much of it is spent sparring with Thomas Nagel, and while Ruse is “just not sure that a secular Aristotelianism has staying power,” he is very sure that the problem of consciousness “doesn’t really seem to be something that is going to wreck evolutionary theorizing” (172). And if neo-Darwinism can avoid reductive materialism, that is probably true. He rejects epiphenomenalism and dualism, acknowledging sentience in a variety of (even rudimentary) forms; but what of his claim that in Darwinian science “any kind of nonmechanical understanding is ruled out” (154)? With materialism and dualism off the table, and Nagel’s panpsychist monism in doubt, that would seem to leave only emergentist theories, where consciousness supervenes on a self-organizing material base. These are often mechanical but also tend to revert to dualism or reductive materialism, as Ruse admits. In the end, he winds his way back to something like Nagel’s neutral monism but in no way addresses the latter’s argument (Nagel calls it “conjunctive”) 352 Book Reviews that, if the conditions for the evolution of mind must be elementary to the universe, given the sort of thing mind is, then its evolution is inevitable, embedded in the nature of things and thus teleological. So Ruse’s conclusion that Darwinism “does quite fine by mind,” proving its adaptive value and selective origin and taking it “as a given,” looks too easy. There is a great deal more one could say in favor of this book, its clarity, tone, and economy in managing a welter of difficult material across multiple fields. Ruse knows where he stands, grants his interlocutors a good hearing, and is not out to settle all scores. He writes with a lightness of touch that is more than stylistic—it is open and joyful. We can of course imagine other and perhaps more detailed histories of teleology as a concept. Readers of this journal will particularly want to compare Ruse with Étienne Gilson’s From Aristotle to Darwin, keeping an eye on the twin themes of organic development and vitalism. At present, however, this is the most complete study of teleology available. It also happens to be N&V an excellent read. Sean Hayden Tennessee Wesleyan University Athens, TN An Avant-garde Theological Generation: The Nouvelle Théologie and the French Crisis of Modernity by Jon Kirwan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), xiv + 311 pp. Kirwan situates his book as a work of historical theology. He seeks to locate the main French contributors to the nouvelle théologie within the context of their generational cohort, formed by World War I and the Great Depression. He focuses on notable Jesuits (associated with the Fourvière theologate) and Dominicans (associated with the theologate at Le Saulchoir). The Jesuits include Henri de Lubac, Jean Daniélou, Henri Bouillard, and Gaston Fessard; and the Dominicans include Marie-Dominique Chenu, Yves Congar, Louis Charlier, Henri-Marie Féret, and René Daguet. Kirwan describes his project as one of “global history” that treats its subject within its surrounding political-economic-cultural context (16). Different generations are shaped by different contexts. The influential work of Jürgen Mettepenningen has described the nouvelle théologie as unfolding in four phases: 1935–1942, 1942–1950, Book Reviews 353 1950–1962, and 1962–1965. Kirwan demonstrates that this periodization does not work, both for reasons internal to the unfolding of the nouvelle théologie, and because it leaves out the larger political-economic-cultural contexts as well as pre-1935 writings, influences, and dialogue partners. In chapter 1, employing cultural history’s generational theory, Kirwan describes twentieth-century French “generations.” He begins with the “generation of 1890” (born 1860–1875), also called the “generation of Dreyfus.” The “generation of 1912” (born 1875–1885) receives the name “the generation of Agathon.” The philosopher Maurice Blondel belonged to the Dreyfus generation, as did the Dominican Ambroise Gardeil and the Catholic Modernists Alfrey Loisy, Lucien Laberthonnière, and Édouard Le Roy. Members of the Agathon generation (named for a pseudonym shared by Henri Massis and Alfred de Tarde, who rose up against the decadence and defeatism of the preceding generation) include the Dominican Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Jacques Maritain, Georges Bernanos, and Gabriel Marcel. Next comes the “generation of fire” (born 1885–1895) including many who fought or served in World War I; and finally the “generation of crisis” or the “generation of 1930” (born 1895– 1905), to which belong the main figures studied by Kirwan, among them Henri de Lubac (who served in the war), Yves Congar, Jean Daniélou, and Marie-Dominique Chenu. This last-named generation, as Kirwan says, “experienced an almost interminable series of crises from adolescence onwards: the First World War, the Great Depression, the rise of communism and fascism, and the Second World War. They had a sense that France, and even Western Civilization, had spent itself and remained in a perpetual state of upheaval” (37–38). Briefly, Kirwan describes the Dreyfus controversy and its consequences, including the “1905 anticlerical backlash that established an official programme of secularism, or laïcité” (43). He notes that the Catholic Modernists in the Dreyfus generation were shaped both by philosophical and historical-critical impulses. With Kant, they accepted that “religious knowledge” has to do with practical rather than speculative reason (45). With the historical critics, they questioned the veracity both of the Bible and of Catholic dogma. Politically, their sympathies were on the liberal left, though not the far left. After a quick survey of Albert Loisy’s and George Tyrrell’s approaches, Kirwan devotes ten pages to Blondel. Blondel developed a phenomenological path, rooted in human desire and action (through an analysis of the will’s willing), to demonstrate the existence of God. Blondel faulted the neo-Scholastics for a rigid and jaundiced defensiveness vis-à-vis modernity, 354 Book Reviews for a conceptualist epistemology unable to handle religious reality (due to being separated from action and life), and for causing atheism and secularism due to a sharp dualism between nature and grace. Blondel also argued that the neo-Scholastics, with their emphasis on timeless propositions, cut the true historical ground out from under Tradition and development of doctrine. For Blondel, Tradition relies not simply upon texts or other monuments but upon the lived experience of the Church in the present, which can be counted upon to gestate or generate previously unarticulated truths of faith and to prune away other elements, thereby freeing the future from the limitations of the present. This understanding of Tradition suggests, as Kirwan says, that the Church is not strictly answerable to texts or evidences but rather “is essentially self-justifying, carrying her own inner proofs within her,” as unfolded in the action or “Christian practice” of her communal life (61–62). I will skip over Kirwan’s much briefer summaries of Laberthonnière and Le Roy, though it is important to note that the latter’s Kantian understanding of Catholic dogma goes well beyond the viewpoint of Blondel. Kirwan devotes a chapter to the generations of 1890 and 1912, in preparation for his treatment of the French figures of the nouvelle théologie. He shows that significant movements in the direction of historical thinking were already afoot at the turn of the twentieth century among neo-Scholastic thinkers. In 1893, Dominicans including Ambroise Gardeil, Pierre Mandonnet, and Antonin Sertillanges, had founded Revue thomiste to undertake a more richly historical engagement with Aquinas’s work (as distinct from reading Aquinas through his Commentators). By 1910, two further historically oriented theological journals had been founded: Revue des sciences philosophiques et théologiques (Dominican) and Recherches de science religieuse (Jesuit). Turning to the generation of 1912, Kirwan lays the groundwork for de Lubac and his contemporaries (the generation of 1930) by observing that the work of Blondel was mediated to the young Jesuits by the brothers Auguste and Albert Valensin—both Jesuit philosophers. Kirwan attends as well to the highly influential Jesuit theologian Pierre Rousselot. Influenced by Blondel, Rousselot attempted to save Thomism from the critique mounted by Blondel. He did so by exploring “intellection”—via a neo-Platonic reading of Aquinas—as a form of action, and by probing further into the natural–supernatural relationship along Blondelian lines. Influenced by Rousselot and Blondel, Joseph Maréchal developed an epistemology rooted in “an a priori intellectual dynamism in which every act of judgement extends beyond the formal objects of the intellect” (93). A further chapter examines in more detail the Jesuit formation of the Book Reviews 355 generation of 1930, with a focus on de Lubac. Kirwan sketches the powerful impact of the war upon this generation, and he also benefits from access to de Lubac’s letters, journals, and earliest unpublished writings. Already in the 1920s the young Jesuits detested neo-Scholasticism and planned to overthrow it. In large part, their motives were rooted in apologetics. They could perceive the intellectuals and the working class slipping away from the Catholic Church. Kirwan describes the condemnation of the rightwing French movement Action française in 1926 and the emergence of Left Catholicism through diverse energetic figures and through the journals Esprit, La Vie intellectuelle, and Sept. With his teacher M.-D. Chenu, Congar began to plan for the dissolution of neo-Scholasticism, joining the young Jesuits in this effort. After summarizing the arguments of de Lubac’s 1938 Catholicisme— arguments that attempt to offer “a new apologetic method” for spreading the faith and promoting a “Catholic humanism” (170, 173)—Kirwan goes on to summarize the arguments of Chenu’s 1937 Une école de théologie. He also attends to a 1932 article by Chenu titled “Les yeux de la foi” (with a nod to Rousselot), in which “Chenu makes a distinction between the dogmatic and juridical aspects of faith on the one hand and the non-conceptual and mystical drive to understand the object of faith, God himself, on the other” (177). The difficulty raised by these writings is whether, for Chenu, “dogmatic propositions can maintain any claims to immutability” (179). Kirwan critically examines Jacques Maritain’s 1936 Humanisme intégral. What interests Kirwan is Maritain’s strongly positive appraisal of the modern emphasis on “human rights, justice, and solidarity,” which led Maritain to affirm “religious liberty” and “secular democracy” (191– 92) and also to attempt to affirm what was positive in the aspirations of the Marxists. Briefly, Kirwan presents Congar’s work on ecumenism, before turning to various Dominicans and Jesuits on art, architecture, and engagement with Marxism. He examines the young Dominicans’ encouragement of the architect Le Corbusier and the use (in the Jesuit Gaston Fessard’s 1936 Pax nostra) of an offensive historical dialectic involving Judaism and paganism, with the “Jew” (communism) clinging to his particularity and the “pagan” clinging to his universality (fascism). In a chapter about the 1940s, Kirwan traces the ascent of the nouvelle théologie and of “Left Catholicism,” an ascent that came about partly due to the collaboration of many of conservative Catholics with the Vichy puppet-government of Marshal Phillipe Pétain. He credits Fessard for quickly diagnosing the reality of Nazism, and he credits the young Jesu- 356 Book Reviews its with founding and contributing to a journal of spiritual Resistance, Cahiers du témoignage chrétien. During the war years, theological projects continued, among them the founding of the patristics series Sources chrétiennes and the founding of a new series of works in “positive theology,” Théologie. De Lubac gave lectures, published in 1942, that presaged Surnaturel. Among the problems that de Lubac identified as in need of serious engagement were “the development of dogma, the supernatural, and Biblical criticism,” as well as dimensions of the Eucharist other than the real presence (210). Among de Lubac’s other works of this period, Kirwan devotes about five pages to Surnaturel and a couple pages to The Discovery of God. The basic arguments of these books are found already in Blondel and Rousselot, even if de Lubac presses somewhat farther. During the same period, de Lubac published a book on Origen’s understanding of Scripture, in which he argued that “ultimate truth in the Scriptures is not ultimately propositional but rather is contained in the entire text and is Christ himself ” (221). In addition, Kirwan attends to Henri Bouillard’s argument that both the immutability of dogma and its historical-cultural embeddedness can be defended by considering that “absolutes can be seized, but never in an absolute representation, only in an absolute affirmation. The latter, however, can only be apprehended through competent historical theology” (224). A final section of this chapter on the 1940s details the triumph of “Left Catholicism” or “Social Catholicism” after the fall of Vichy and Nazism. This triumph was already underway during the war, through the “worker-priest movement” (240), but it accelerated tremendously in the heady days after the war. In this context, he examines Daniélou’s seminal 1946 “Les orientations des présentes pensée religieuse.” This article famously received pushback from neo-Scholastic Dominicans, leading ultimately to the condemnation of certain elements of the nouvelle théologie in Pope Pius XII’s 1950 encyclical Humani Generis, and also to the silencing of de Lubac, Congar, and others in the early 1950s. Kirwan gives fascinating details regarding the impact that Maritain, de Lubac, and others had upon Angelo Roncalli (the future Pope John XXIII) and Giovanni Battista Montini (the future Pope Paul VI). He explores the unfolding of the Council, with particular attention to Chenu and Congar. The split between Concilium and Communio after the Council receives a few pages at the end of the book. Kirwan’s underlying theme is that Blondel and his followers, above all de Lubac, opened the door to slippage on the enduring truth-status of dogmatic propositions, in part due to the strident ecclesiastical fall Book Reviews 357 narratives that they repeatedly painted with regard to the Church’s second millennium (especially the post-Tridentine period), and in part due to Blondel’s anti-propositional account of Tradition. Granted that a number of the leaders of the nouvelle théologie sincerely abhorred modernism, Kirwan has shown that the leaders of the nouvelle théologie were naïve about their ability to hold off the full force of Modernist understandings of dogma, when and if they accomplished their goal of destroying the neo-Scholastic understanding of the Church. Kirwan’s book ends with de Lubac and Daniélou suffering “bitter persecution . . . in their own communities” (277). More attention needs to be paid to two matters. First of all, what can be counted as real problems in neo-Scholasticism, given that (as Kirwan’s book shows) it had evident strengths? Second, is there a way to move forward today in receiving the best teachings of the nouvelle théologie (including as found in Vatican II and the magisterial teachings of the postconciliar Popes) while also retrieving the best insights of the neo-Scholastics, especially regarding dogma and metaphysics? Is there a way to end the mutual search-and-destroy efforts and mutual blaming-for-everything that the neo-Scholastics and the nouvelle théologie unleashed upon each other in the period after World War II? As the aftermath of the Council revealed, de Lubac and GarrigouLagrange were united in their commitment to opposing the Modernist attack upon the enduring truth of the Church’s dogmatic and moral teaching. Now more than ever, due to the dominance of Rahnerian theology in the academy and the broader Church, this unity needs to be reclaimed and N&V insisted upon. Matthew Levering Mundelein Seminary Mundelein, IL On Love and Virtue: Theological Essays by Michael S. Sherwin, O.P. (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2018), xix + 286 pp. There is a point in every great scholarly life at which a collection of previously published essays is not only tolerable but desirable. Father Sherwin has reached that point, and On Love and Virtue: Theological Essays are those essays (some of which have been revised). With his characteristic breadth and intelligence, Father Sherwin shows himself again to be a leading intellectual of Thomistic ressourcement and a fitting 358 Book Reviews torch bearer of Father Pinckaers’ legacy. This volume is the fruit of twenty years of reflection, study, and scholarly activity, and anyone who reads it will benefit. The book organizes the essays into three parts. The first is dedicated to “The Question of Happiness and Human Flourishing.” The second is dedicated to the “History of Christian Reflection on Love.” And the third is dedicated to “The Mystery of Christian Virtue.” The first part, “Happiness and Love in Context,” is rather small and covers only two essays: “Happiness and Its Discontents” and “On Love and War.” They both constitute, each in its own way, a rejection of modern moral philosophy and a defense of ressourcement Thomism. The first intelligibly, insightfully, and accessibly covers a lot of ground: charting the modern divorce of happiness from morality, recovering an ancient view of happiness, explaining the relation of external goods to happiness, and showing how the tragedy and imperfection of natural happiness is a preparation for the Gospel. This essay would be a fantastic undergraduate introduction to the Pinckaersian thesis concerning moralities of obligation and the problems found therein. The second essay uses the affinities between love and war to give an extended reflection on the failures of technocratic (utilitarian) calculus to “solve human problems.” Using Robert McNamara’s failure in the Vietnam war as an example and G. E. M. Anscombe’s writings against contraception as a diagnostic tool, Sherwin successfully shows how the same utilitarian reasoning lies behind both McNamara’s failure and contraception. Though the section on contraception leaves the reader wanting more, Sherwin successfully makes his point: “Incoherence stems from treating sexuality reductively according to the same utilitarian calculus that has sown confusion in our wars.” The second part of the collection, “Love in Historical Perspective,” encompasses five historical essays centered on an Augustinian/Thomistic account of the virtue of charity. The first essay, “If Love It Is: Chaucer, Aquinas, and Love’s Fidelity,” roams freely and coherently between Chaucer, modern psychological research, and Aquinas to explain the complexity of love. Identifying, distinguishing, and relating love as a passion and love as a choice, Sherwin explains not only the fidelity (and infidelity) of love but also how our communities form our loves. The second essay, “Aquinas, Augustine, and the Medieval Scholastic Crisis concerning Charity,” combines two previously published essays, one on charity’s desire and another on the twelfth-century Scholastic crisis concerning love of God. Though Sherwin recognizes that Aquinas’s historical relationship to the twelfth-century controversy is uncertain, he suggests that Aquinas’s psychology of love successfully combines the insights from both sides by separating the two terms of the debate into the virtues of hope and Book Reviews 359 charity. This essay does a good job introducing the reader to the historical ways in which Aquinas’s account of charity is novel. The third essay, “Love in Thomas Aquinas’ Biblical Commentaries: A Sketch,” is a short, informative, and suggestive survey of Aquinas’s treatments of charity in his biblical commentaries. In it, Sherwin shows a general consonance between Aquinas’s systematic treatises and his biblical commentaries on love but leaves the wider selection of texts (a fuller picture) and the thorny question of dates and development for future work. The fourth essay, “Friends at the Table of the Lord: John Chrysostom’s Theology of Divine Friendship,” is an instructive and moving account of how Chrysostom transforms ancient Roman forms of patronage to situate the saints and the poor as special friends and intercessors with God. This essay does a good job of showing the implications of the Eucharistic sacrifice for justice, as well as grounding hospitality (philoxenia) in the friendship of God. The last essay in this section, “The Friend of the Bridegroom Stands and Listens: Augustine on Pastoral Ministry,” fills a lacuna in studies of Augustinian friendship. In it, Sherwin not only articulates Augustine’s general theory of friendship with God, but also shows how Augustine uses this theology to answer the Donatist claims about baptism. In doing so, he offers an important corrective concerning pastoral ministry (and all Christian love): “The bishops are to lead the faithful to Christ; the faithful are to love their bishops only as friends of the bridegroom, and not as the bridegroom.” This essay is required reading for any minister in the Church. The third part of the collection is entitled “Christian Virtue” and encompasses five essays concerning a Thomistic theory of virtue. The first essay, “Virtue as Creative Freedom and Emotional Wisdom,” aims to recover the rich meaning and context of certain moral terms: virtue, knowledge, emotion, and infused virtue. Though it is very short, and so merely wets the appetite, this essay successfully recovers the Thomistic meaning of these terms and exposes some of their counterfeits. The second essay, “Infused Virtue and the Effects of Acquired Vice: A Test Case,” seeks to defend the Thomistic conception of infused cardinal virtues against a Scotist reading (also followed by Odon Lottin). In this Sherwin successfully argues that adult converts not only help to prove the existence of the infused cardinal virtues but also help us make sense of their operation. In the subsequent essay, “The Return to Virtue: Challenges and Opportunities,” Sherwin gives a very short summary of the rise of virtue ethics in the twentieth century. Though overall Sherwin sees this as a positive development in moral philosophy, since it reinserts moral inquiry into the quest for happiness, he admits it is a “mixed blessing,” since it can also give rise to moral/cultural relativism, as well as elitism. Nevertheless, 360 Book Reviews he argues that Aquinas has resources to counter both trends and integrate modern virtue ethics into a comprehensive picture of the Christian life. In the next essay, “Fire Grows in Water: Thomas Aquinas’ Interpretation of Virtue in the Scriptures,” Sherwin aims to give a short introduction to Aquinas’s thought on virtue as presented in his biblical commentaries: virtue is an analogous term grounded in Christ as “the man of perfect virtue” and the Christian life is a “participation in the virtues of Christ.” This essay is a good exposition of Aquinas’s thought and gives the reader a taste of the fuller vision of Aquinas’s theology of virtue, beyond the Summa theologiae. The final essay in this volume, “Christ the Teacher in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas,” is a fantastic short study of Aquinas’s Christology and pedagogy. In it, Sherwin not only successfully connects seemingly disparate parts of Aquinas’s work, but also draws deep insights from them concerning the role of Christ as teacher and friend of the disciples. For any of us who spend time teaching, this essay can help us think about pedagogy in an explicitly Trinitarian and Christological way. The above summaries, though they give a small window into these essays, fail to capture the depth and insight Sherwin brings. Sherwin seamlessly incorporates historical research, literature, psychological research, and an accurate, but not overly granular, exegesis of Aquinas. Quite a few of these essays bear re-reading in a contemplative way, and the reader will come away with some new insight each time. Undoubtedly, this is because Sherwin treats Thomism as a living tradition of thought, one in dialogue with the problems and research of today. Though most of us know it, Aquinas has much to offer and Sherwin proves it, especially concerning friendship, virtue, love, infused virtue, and the restoration of moral terms. In this recovery and creative use of Aquinas’s ethical thought, Sherwin successfully takes up the mantle of his mentor, Father Pinckaers. Thomism is not only a potent intellectual understanding of the world, but a way of life centered on friendship and virtue. Though this high praise is well deserved, this volume is not without desiderata. Many of the essays are suggestive and perceptive, but leave the reader wondering about further implications and other relations. Sherwin often uncovers deeply insightful and impactful readings of Aquinas only to simply pass them over without further exposition. An easy example of this is his essay concerning utilitarian calculus and contraception. From someone so well situated to treat this debate, it is disappointing to get only a page and a half. It is an insightful page and a half, but that only adds to the frustration. Likewise, other essays in the volume are already showing the date of their original publication and could have been updated to track the debate since then. For example, the essay “Infused Virtue and the Effects Book Reviews 361 of Acquired Vice: A Test Case” defends and explains the coexistence of the infused and acquired cardinal virtues. Since its original publication, however, this debate has seen a more vigorous defense of an alternative, though not Scotist, conception. The essay, and the wider debate, would have benefited from an updated essay. Those two issues notwithstanding, I would recommend this volume highly. Sherwin represents the best N&V of Thomism. John Meinert Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady University Baton Rouge, LA Deification in the Latin Patristic Tradition, edited by Jared Ortiz (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2019), ix + 313 pp. It is certainly a welcome experience to come across works today that seek to bridge the polemical gap between the Latin West and the Orthodox East. One of the more remarkable contributions to this conversation is the recent collection of essays on deification among the Latin Fathers published by Catholic University of America Press. The book originated out of a three-day symposium dedicated to the subject at the 2015 Oxford Patristic Conference. Such a topic was wisely chosen, as it is often supposed that the Latin theologians did not articulate a tradition of deification, often focusing instead on the paradigm of nature and grace. While it is the case that certain among the Latin Fathers, Ambrose especially, did in fact prefer the language of nature and grace, one of the consistent themes that emerges from this study is that this in no way precludes an understanding or intellectus that carries the same sense of deification as held by the East. The ecumenical ramifications of such a study needs no exaggeration, but what is more, it also contributes to a needed conversation today regarding the relationship between learning and piety within the academy, as well as the unity of theology as a professional enterprise. The remarkable thing about the subject of deification as a locus theologiae is that, while it retains a rigorous dogmatic and biblical foundation, lending itself easily to the specialties of systematicians, it necessarily involves or ought to involve the interior life of its practitioners as well. At least this was the case for all of the figures studied in this collection. As a topic under which many theological disciplines may be subsumed and synthesized, it also offers a certain unity to the theological science which may be reparative to some extent of 362 Book Reviews the fragmentation that is often seen within the faculties of many graduate schools of theology and divinity. Members of a learned body, who are conscious of certain shared convictions regarding the ethical implications of their respective fields, will soon discover that they have more in common than is usually assumed, despite the disparateness of specialties. The book takes the form of fourteen chapters, most of which are dedicated to one or two principal figures in the Latin patristic tradition, while others examine larger themes, such as the liturgy, or provide more overarching and comparative analysis between multiple figures. After an insightful examination of the theme of deification in the early Latin liturgy, the essays progress chronologically, beginning with several of the early writers and works from North Africa: Tertullian, Cyprian, and the Passion of Perpetua and Felicity. Treatments of Novatian and Hilary of Poitiers follow, with subsequent chapters on the principal Latin theologians of the fourth and fifth centuries: Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine. Situated within the context of the collapse of the Western half of the Roman Empire and the transition into the early Middle Ages, the figures of Peter Chrysologus, Leo the Great, Boethius, Benedict of Nursia, and Gregory the Great round out the study, with a concluding summary comparing the traditions of deification in the East and the West. Though many of the thinkers and writers who are the subjects of the various chapters of this study had unique points of emphasis and even methods of articulation, more often than not, there were remarkable points of commonality. One of the most prominent being the reluctance among many of the Latin Fathers to use such words as deificare, deificatio, or any of its derivatives when speaking about the workings of grace in the life of the Christian. The reasonings behind this are debated, but some of the plausible theories put forward in this study include the notion that such doctrines were too advanced for the average audience, or that they suggested the wrong connotations given certain imperial customs then in force in many of the provinces where these respective theologians were preaching and writing. Nonetheless, as many of the scholars in this study went to great lengths to demonstrate, the same intellectus or understanding of deification was signified through the various conventional analogies or concepts that were deemed more appropriate and better suited for their respective listeners. Some of the more unique idioms treated here that fall under the category of communicatio idiomatum include that of the “loaning or borrowing” that takes place between the divine nature of Christ and the human nature of humanity, seen most clearly in the writings of Novatian of Rome. Another is the notion, developed by Tertullian out of a basis in Roman Book Reviews 363 law, of Christ as the sequester, whereby Jesus, through his Incarnation, even more than simply identifying with the flesh of man, retains the obligation to restore this same flesh, now divinized, back to man in the eschaton. In terms of certain themes concerning deification which many of the Latin Fathers, and especially those of the fourth and fifth centuries, shared in common, one of the more prominent is the various ways in which the “exchange formula” of Athanasius was employed, particularly in their preaching and commentaries upon Scripture. Another common theme is that of divine adoption. This teaching, found especially in the writings of Ambrose, Jerome, Peter Chrysologus, and many other Fathers, is largely found in preaching addressed to neophytes and catechumens as it is closely linked to the sacrament of baptism. One of the most prevalent notions of deification seen throughout this study and which would have a long history in the Latin West is that of the progressive restoration of the image and likeness of God within man. In North Africa, Cyprian would preach about a needed deifica disciplina, the ascetical effort required for the sanctifying transformation of the interior life, while Augustine would subsequently speak of a certain “deified knowledge” that is the result of moral transfiguration. Another common element seen in many of the discourses of the Latin Fathers is the use of certain biblical texts to undergird their teaching of deification, foremost among those being Psalm 82, 2 Peter 1:4, and especially the doctrine of Saint Paul, particularly 2 Corinthians 8:9 and the Epistle to the Ephesians, wherein the teaching of divine adoption is expounded at great length. Perhaps the greatest commonality shared by the theologians concerned in this study is certainly the centrality of Jesus. No matter the particular idiom, biblical text, analogy, or metaphor, in the end, the doctrine of these Fathers always resolves back to the person of Christ and the implications for mankind of his Incarnation and resurrection. Even more than just emphasizing the essential mission of Christ for the redemption of mankind, many of these Fathers also drew attention to the moral and individual dimension of friendship and intimacy with the person of the Savior, the result of grace and the response of unmeasured love freely given. Some of the particular strengths of the book include its remarkable accessibility. It has a certain continuity of style and format throughout, which include generous “signposting,” section headings, and concluding summaries at the end of each chapter. There are also copious footnotes throughout and a helpful bibliography at the end for those who might wish to follow up with their own research. Another asset to this study is its concluding chapter by Norman Russell, which summarizes the entire book and offers a comparative study with the Eastern doctrine of 364 Book Reviews deification. Besides highlighting the Latin patristic reception of certain Platonic themes, the Christological foundation of deification, and its ecclesial nature and eschatological orientation, one of the unique aspects seen throughout this book that Russell draws attention to is the role of monasticism. Many of the Fathers in both the Eastern and Western tradition lived and worked out of a monastic context, and in this regard, it was particularly good to see the essay contributed by Father Luke Dysinger, O.S.B., focusing on Benedict of Nursia and Gregory the Great, as the doctrine of deification is not often synonymous with their writings, yet is clearly a dominant theme for both of them. In terms of certain weaknesses of the text, the treatment of Boethius, while strong from a philosophical perspective, appears to be more of a stretch in terms of inclusion in this collection. As the author, Michael Wiitala, rightly observes, Christ is everywhere absent in Boethius’s notion of deification, as is the Scriptures and any reference to the previous patristic tradition. Another fault is the glaring lacuna of any treatment of John Cassian. Given Russell’s estimation of the importance of the monastic theological tradition behind the Church’s teaching on deification, especially that of Cassian for the Latin West, such a study, as instanced by the many contributions of Father Columba Stewart, O.S.B., would be a welcome addition to round out the essays in this collection. Looking ahead, it might be suggested that a study of the ramifications of this topic within the context of ecumenism would be particularly apropos, especially given the context of monasticism, a deeply shared ecclesial experience for both the East and the West. Another might be to carry forward the research of this book into the Middle Ages and beyond with a companion volume or series. Much fruitful study has been done of late to dispel any notion of a lack of theological continuity between the age of the Fathers and that of the Schoolmen, and the subject of deification is not least among such shared concerns. For instance, one has only to peruse the writings of the great twelfth-century Cistercians and Victorines to see that the theme of rectification of the soul and the restoration of the image and likeness in man was taken quite seriously. Even closer to our own time, we see, for example, in the person of Blessed Columba Marmion, O.S.B., someone whom Saint John Paul II deemed to be the “Doctor of N&V Divine Adoption.” Stephen Tomlinson The Catholic University of America Washington, DC