THE THOMIST
A SPECULATIVE QUARTERLY REVIEW
OF THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY

EDITORs:

THE DoMINICAN

Publishers:

VoL. XXXV

FATHERS oF THE PROVINCE oF ST. JosEPH

The Thomist Press, Washington, D. C. 20017

APRIL, 1971

No.2

SCHILLEBEECKX AND THE ECCLESIAL FUNCTION
OF CRITICAL NEGATIVITY

0

NE OF THE theological issues which Edward Schillebeeckx, 0. P., has treated most thoroughly in the past
thirty years is that of the relationship between the
Church and the world, an area in which he sees a primary task
of the Church to be that of exercizing a function of " critical
negativity " over against human society. By this term he
means " a positive power which continues to exert constant
pressure in order to bring about a better world, without
humanity itself being sacrificed in the process." 1 It is the
1 Schillebeeckx, "Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's
Future on Earth," God the Future of Man, trans. N. D. Smith (New York: Sheed
and Ward, 1968), p. 191. It was in this epilogue that Schillebeeckx first used the
term " critical negativity," but the reality to which this term refers was already
treated not only in some of the lectures which he gave in this country in late
1967 and which appear as the first five chapters of God the Future of Man but
also in essays spanning the whole of his theological activity. The most important
of these are to be found in the third and fourth volumes of his collected writings,
entitled respectively W ereld en kerk (World and Church) and De zending van de
kerk (The mission of the Church) .

207

208

JAMES A. WISEMAN

purpose of this article first to situate this function within the
larger context of Schillebeeckx's ecclesiology, next to present
his understanding of the genesis, content, stages, and bearers
of this function within the Church, and finally to offer some
critical reflections on his position.

I.

THE EccLESIOLOGICAL
NoTION

CoNTEXT

OF CRITICAL

OF ScHILLEBEECKX's

NEGATIVITY

The Church as Sacrament of the Risen Christ and
Sacrament of the World
Schillebeeckx has not given to the nature and mission of the
Church as systematic an analysis as that found, for example,
in his work on marriage/ so it is necessary to draw this overview of his ecclesiology from a number of his writings. The
most basic concept is that the Church is a sacrament and that
in a twofold sense-the sacrament of the risen Christ and the
sacrament of the world. The former sense is developed at some
length in Christ the Sacrament of the Encounter with God.
In the first chapter of this work Schillebeeckx argues that" the
man Jesus, as the personal visible realization of the divine
grace of redemption, is the sacrament, the primordial sacrament, because this man, the Son of God himself, is intended by
the Father to be in his humanity the only way to the actuality
of redemption." 3 For Jesus' contemporaries, to be approached
by him was to be invited to a personal encounter with the
living God.
Those of us living after Christ's glorification cannot, of
course, encounter him in his own flesh, but he does become
present for us by taking up earthly realities into his saving
activity: "This is precisely what the sacraments are: the face
Het huwelijk: aardse werkelijkheid en heilsmysterie (Bilthoven: H. Nelissen,
English trans. by N. D. Smith: Marriage: Human Reality and Saving
Mystery (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1965).
3 Christ the Sacrament of the Encounter
with God, trans. Paul Barrett, 0. P.
et al. (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1968), p. 15. This is a translation of
Christus, sacrament van de Godsontmoeting (Bilthoven: H. Nelissen, 1960).
2

1968).

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

of redemption turned visibly towards us." 4 This is true above
all of the Church herself, the theme to which Schillebeeckx
devotes his second chapter, "The Church, Sacrament of the
Risen Christ," where he says that "in his messianic sacrifice,
which the Father accepts, Christ in his glorified body is himself the eschatological redemptive community of the Church .
. . . The earthly Church is the visible realization of this saving
reality in history. The Church is a visible communion in
grace." 5 The essence of the Church accordingly consists in
the fact that in her the final goal of grace achieved by Christ
becomes visibly present.
If the Church is in this respect sacramentum Christi, manifesting to all men the salvation wrought by" the one mediator
5), she is
of God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (I Tim.
from another point of view sacramentum mundi, the sacrament
of the world, making manifest what is in fact already present
in the concrete reality of every human experience of existence
in the world, namely, our being hidden in and our being made
one by God's graciousness. 6 The Church is never the first
"breakthrough" in man; rather, she brings to self-consciousness what is already present in human life inasmuch as she
lives out in a historically visible way what is elsewhere still
calling out for a concrete, explicit form-a true community of
men united with one another and with God. This was the
theme of Schillebeeckx's address to the International Congress
of Theologians which met at Rome in the autumn of 1966/
' Ibid., p. 43.
"Ibid., p. 47.
" Het leed der ervaring van Gods verborgenheid,"
W ereld en
Vol. III; Bilthoven:
H. Nelissen, 1966), p. 131.
This article is a lecture given before the congress of the " Verenigde Studentenverenigingen van de Theologische Faculteiten in het Nederlands taalgebied," (Jan.
13-15, 1966).
•" De Ecclesia ut sacramento mundi," Acta Congressus lnternationalis de
Theologia Concilii Vaticani II: Romae, diebus :26 septembris-1 octobris 1966
celebrati, ed. Adolfus Schonmetzer, S. I. (Vatican City: Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis,
1968), pp. 48-53. Dutch version: " De kerk, 'sacrament van de wereld,' " De
zending van de kerk (" Theologische Peilingen," Vol. IV; Bilthoven: H. Nelissen,
1968)' pp. 40-45.
• Schillebeeckx,

kerk (" Theologische Peilingen,"

210

JAMES A. WISEMAN

and to this theme he has since returned several times. In an
essay first published in Holland in 1967 he wrote that in the
koinonia or community of love which the Church is, there must
become visible that which God intends for the whole world,
and that is to bind men into a brotherhood on the basis of their
communion with God in his representative, Christ Jesus. 8
The way in which the Church manifests this divine intention
is made more explicit in " Secularization and Christian Belief
in God," where he argues that the Church is neither entirely
separate from the world nor identified with it. Rather, " she is
the ' sacrament of the world,' the human community of believers which gives utterance to God and proclaims him in the
secular world, thanks him in Christ Jesus and can say quite
openly, in the name of all mankind: 'God is my song.'" 9
This he sees as the first humanizing task of the Church-to
celebrate, to thank, and to commemorate, and this she does
above all in the liturgy. Thus he says:
The Church and her liturgy are the world ... at that profound
level on which the world utters its own mystery in a conscious and
mature confession, that mystery from which and in which it lives,
thanks to Christ, and thus fulfills and realizes itself precisely as
Christ's world; ... Hence we celebrate in the Church what is being
accomplished outside our churches in human history, insofar as this
can be called salvation history. 10

The Church's Dialogue with the World
Schillebeeckx relates this concept of sacramentum mundi to
the possibility and necessity of the Church's dialogue with the
world, a dialogue which includes the Church's critical function
vis-a-vis society. Quoting Vatican Il's Pastoral Constitution
on the Church in the Modern World (Gaudium et spes) to the
effect that the Church is " the sign of that spirit of brotherhood by which sincere dialogue is not only made possible but
8 "Christelijk
geloof en aardse toekomstverwachting," De zending van de kerk,
p. 68.
• "Secularization and Christian Belief in God," God the Future of Man, p. 84.
10 " Secular Worship and Church Liturgy,"
ibid., p. 109.

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

211

strengthened" (n. 92), he goes on to ask whether the Church,
as sacrament of this confraternity of all men, can in fact be
so clearly separated from the world as to be its partner in
dialogue. 11 After all, the Church is itself built up of men in
the world. As the Council has said, " as formed of men, the
Church is already present here on earth. She consists of
members of the society of men on earth who are called to give
to the family of the children of God in the history of mankind
the form which must be further extended until the coming of
the Lord" (Gaudinm et spes, n. 40). But this does not mean
that dialogue between the Church and the world is impossible
but only that in Christians the world itself is present in the
Church and that this dialogue will therefore be, in the first
place, an inter-Christian one, " a dialogue among Christians
themselves both about their unique testimony of the faith
and about the promotion of the well-being of the world and
society." 12
Further, Schillebeeckx notes a second form of dialogue. The
whole of mankind does not belong concretely and actually to
the sacramental communion of the Church in any of the
Christian denominations. The Church thus encounters a community of men who have views different from hers about
mankind and human society but who are nevertheless in the
same worldly sphere as Christians. Here are other partners
with whom dialogue is both possible and necessary, "not only
with regard to the Church's witness and that of non-Christians,
but also with regard to this shared work of building up the
world and promoting the well-being of all peoples." 13
Third, from a sociological point of view the Church is just
one institution in society alongside many other groups. All
of these participate in the task of working for the betterment
of mankind, and because of this common sphere of work
dialogue is possible among all these different bodies; " what is
more, because of social interrelationships, this dialogue is very
necessary." 14
11 "

The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," ibid., p. 129 .
" Ibid., p. 131.
H Ibid.

.. Ibid., p. 130.

JAMES A. WISEMAN

Concerning the general nature of this dialogue Schillebeeckx
writes that both the Church and the world talk about the same
thing-man in the world and in society-but do so from
different points of view. 15 The need of dialogue derives precisely
from this fact that both the Church and the world have special
contributions to make. To determine what the Church's special
contribution is, he argues that we must see how it derives from
the peculiar mission of the Church.

The Religious Mission of the Church
Schillebeeckx has always been quite clear that the Church's
mission is properly religious. In conferences given to Dominican confreres in
he complained that the Church
signifies for many workers all kinds of social and political
positions of power, which these men see as opposed to their
own desires. Concretely they meet the Church not on her
properly religious terrain but in non-essential temporal manifestations.16 In an article written more than a decade later
he again declared that the Church " has a religious mission,
not a political or socio-economic one," 17 though, if circumstances call for it, she can help build structures to help men,
above all the poor. And in one of the American lectures he
supported this position by quoting Gaudium et spes:
The sphere from which the Church has a special contribution to
make to the dialogue with the world in view of building up the
world and promoting man's well-being was very properly indicated
by the council as follows: " thus the mission of the Church will
show its religious, and by that very fact its supremely human
character." In other words, the Church makes her contribution
from the religious sphere.18
15

Ibid., p. 188.

Het kerkelijk apostolaat in verband met de situatie 1945-1954," Wereld en
kerk, p. 95.
17 " Christenlijk geloof en aardse toekomstverwachting,'
De zending van de kerk,
p. 58.
18 " The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," God the Future of Man, p. 188,
quoting in part Gaudium et spes, n. 11.
16 "

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

213

This religious character of the Church's mission, this concern
with Someone and not only with man and his history, is so
important that, if the Church should ever become simply
identical with " the world " or with " improving the world,"
she would already have ceased to bring it a message. 19 All the
same, there is a legitimate place for " improving the world "
precisely within this religious mission, for this mission has,
according to Schillebeeckx, a twofold aspect, one pole of which
he terms " evangelization " and the other the " Christian
leavening of life together on earth":
Theologians bring forward raore clearly the fact that the Church,
the entire People of God, has essentially a double mission: the
first concerns the order of salvation, the second-intrinsically
derived from the first-deals with the ordering of the temporal to
salvation. Both aspects of the one mission of the Church (evangelization and Christian leavening of life together on earth) must be
found in all active believers.20
In her evangelical or " exclusively religious " role, the Church
stands forth as the place where what is really relevant to man
and ultimately inexpressible can be brought to expression. She
here serves "as humanity's representative, an interpreter for
the whole of mankind, the prophetess who gives a name to the
mystery from which all men are to live." 21

The Christian Calling in the Temporal Order
If the Church has not always been fully conscious of the
evangelical aspect of her mission, the derivative calling to
"Secularization and Christian Belief in God," God the Future of Man, p. 79.
De typologische definitie van de christelijke leek volgens Vaticanum II,"
De zending van de kerk, p. 151. Earlier in this essay Schillebeeckx writes that
hesitations about the nature of the laity often arise because " one speaks of the
total mission of the Church before stressing that precisely the primary and
exclusively religious and transcendent mission of the Church has as a consequence
a secondary but still specifically ecclesial mission in the world, namely, the ordering
of the earthly process of humanization towards salvation" (p. 145). This essay
first appeared in De kerk van Vaticanum II: Commentaren op de concilieconstitutie
over de kerk, ed G. Barauna (Bilthoven, 1966), Vol. II, pp. 285-304.
111 " Secularization and Christian Belief in God," God the Future of Man, p. 83.
19

20 "

JAMES A. WISEMAN

minister to the needs of the temporal order has at times been
even further from her consciousness, and yet, argues Schillebeeckx, this temporal involvement, no less than the call to
evangelize, is demanded by the very nature of Christianity.
He has developed this thesis in many places and in a number
of interrelated ways, but the core of his argument is the following: Creation itself, including everything that has come to be
through the cultural work of the human race, is the first expression of God's love for man. 22 It is, furthermore, a basic principle
of Christian faith that creation and redemption form a single
divine order: the same God who is Creator is also Savior, the
same God is Lord of human history as well as of salvation
history. The salvific love of this creating, redeeming God became manifest with special intensity in the death of Jesus
Christ, which was an act of " radical love for man, in its
radicality conceivable only from out of God's own personal
love for man." 23 In the life and death of Jesus it became clear
that the only adequate human answer to this love of God is a
radical love for one's fellowman, a love so radical and absolute
that it is intrinsically an absolute witnessing of God. Man's
"yes" to his fellowman, as his response to God's own "yes"
to him, is therefore an intrinsically religious act, something to
which Catholic tradition has always borne witness by seeing
in agape a love both of God and man and so calling this
unconditional being for one's fellowman a theological or divine
virtue. 24
Now, the neighbor whom we are to love in this way is no
abstract " human nature," just as our humanity is no mere
communion among purely interiorized subjects. No, we are
called to love the whole man and so must evidence not just
"neighborliness" but a concern for the socio-economic, politi22 " Grondslag
van de wereldlijke plaats van de leek in de kerk," De zending
van de kerk, p. 77. This article first appeared in Tijdschrift voor Geestelijk Leven,
V (1949), pp. 146-66, under the title "Theologische grondslagen van de lekenspiritualiteit." See also "Nederig Hurnanisrne," Wereld en kerk, p. 77.
•• " Christelijk geloof en aardse toekornstverwachting," De zending van de kerk,
p. 68.
•• " Het leed der ervaring van Gods verborgenheid," W ereld en kerk, pp. 123-24.

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

215

cal, and cultural well-being of others. Insofar as such concern
is part of caring for one's neighbor as an expression of charity,
"the striving for a better earthly future cannot be adequately
differentiated from the striving for the one thing needful." 25
Membership in the Church must imply a hoping and striving
impatience to change the appearance of the world out of love
for man. This striving is not, to be sure, identical with the
coming of the Kingdom of God but nevertheless forms a truly
religious element in that coming, being " most intimately involved in the growth of the Kingdom of God." w
To substantiate this, Schillebeeckx notes that the final text
of Gaudium et spes says that the form of this world is already
passing away, whereas an earlier draft said only that it will
pass away. This final text, he comments, expresses the fact
that in the earthly movement toward the future the definitive
presence of the Kingdom, the eschaton, is itself already at
work/ 7 just as another text from Gaudium et spes, which
asserts that " the Spirit of God ... is actively present in this
development [of the social order]" (n. 26), makes it clear that
the social dynamism which is passing through the world is to
be seen as a moment of today's salvation history. 28
Because of this intrinsic relation of the building up of human
society to the mystery of the Kingdom of God, there will
always be a certain residual "inconceivability" in the Christian's dedication to earthly tasks: the Christian does not know
precisely where his radical devotion to his fellowmen is leading him, though he knows well that ultimately it is not
meaningless. 29 The Kingdom of God
is a Kingdom of justice, peace and love, a Kingdom where there
will be no evil, nor mourning, nor crying, nor pain (II Peter 3: 13;
Apoc. 21: 4). Christian hope knows that this possibility is given
to man as a grace, and so the Christian lives in the conscious faith
that his faithful commitment to a better temporal order is not in
25 "

Christelijk geloof en aardse toekomstverwachting,"

p. 56, n. 5.
20 Ibid., p. 56.

27

Ibid.

28

Ibid., p. 48.

De zending van de kerT:,
•• Ibid., p. 70.

JAMES A. WISEMAN

vain, although he does not see how this temporal order which is not
yet the promised Kingdom can be the obscure beginning of the
eschaton. 30

This makes the Christian's devotion to earthly affairs thematically inconceivable. He himself is standing before a mystery and
must confess this in all simplicity to those who ask him why
he devotes himself to earthly tasks. This thematic inconceivability does not, however, lessen his devotion but radicalizes it,
for it is the reverse side of God's own love for man. 31 The
ultimate meaning of the building up of the earth thus passes
over into mystery, accessible only to faith: "See here God's
dwelling among men. He shall dwell with them. They shall be
his people and he himself, God-with-them, shall be their God"
(Apoc.
3). It is in this perspective of the eschatological
fulfillment that believers must work for the temporal restoration of this world to make it a dwelling worthy of the children
of God, the practical result of which will be that we so structure
the world that men can live a life truly human and Christian
and so more easily fulfill the will of God. 32

Why This Temporal Mission Is So Emphasized Today
If this concern for a more human temporal order is an
integral part of Christianity itself, there are, suggests Schillebeeckx, particular grounds for so much emphasis on this
concern precisely today. Since faith, in its expression, never
runs ahead of human experiences, the introduction of new
temporal experiences will give rise to a faith-consciousness of
tasks and obligations not grasped in earlier times. 33 Whenever
for reasons of a new way of relating to earthly things the
30 "
31 "

Church, Magisterium and Politics," God the Future of Man, p. 157.
Christelijk geloof en aardse toekomstverwachting," De zending van de kerlc,

p. 70.
32 " Kerk en wereld," Wereld en kerk, pp. 141-42. This article is based on a
lecture given in Rome on Sept. 16, 1964, and was first published in Tijdschrift voor
,Theologie, IV (1964), pp. 386-99.
33 " Terugblik
en synthese," De zending van de kerk, p. 154. This article first
appeared under the title "Un nouveau type de laic," La nouvelle image de l'Egli8e,
ed. Bernard Lambert, 0. P. (Tours: Marne, 1967).

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

217

picture of man himself changes, the conclusions formerly drawn
from Christianity should themselves change; they must be
changed if they are to remain truly in accord with Christianity.34 Schillebeeckx goes on to argue that just such a new
way of man's relating to earthly things has come about, with
profound consequences. To corroborate this claim he relies
heavily on the work of such men as the German sociologist
Hans Freyer, who has analyzed this process in his book,
Theorie des gegenwartigen Zeitalters (Theory of the Present
Age) .s5
Freyer begins by noting that man has been touched in his
depths by the " law of this epoch," changed even as regards
his moral needs, his dreams, and his neuroses. 36 Man has
become fascinated by the " makability " of the material world,
by his power to transform raw materials into objects undreamt
of a century ago, and has further learned so to organize his
world of work with the help of machines that great quantities
of objects can me manufactured in ever shorter periods of time.
Nor is this manipulatory power of organization limited to the
material world-it has been extended to society itself. Already
in the forties of the last century, de Tocqueville, Lorenz von
Stein, and others noted that revolutionaries no longer fought.
for certain rights or advantages or against single oppressive
situations but had plans for an entirely new society. 31 Today
it is no longer a matter for surprise when plans for the total
reconstruction of society are drawn up. Every year there
appear books promising precisely this in their titles. The
belief that one can organize society or the state in the way
one organizes the mass production of a factory belongs to the
"manager's" way of thinking, hence to one of the most influential truths of this epoch. 38 Ours is the first civilization to be
••" De kerk op drift? " De zending van de kerk, p. 29. This article first
appeared in Tijdschrift voor Geestlijk Leven, XXII (1966), pp. 533-54.
85 Hans
Freyer, Theorie des gegenwiirtigen Zeitalters (Stuttgart:
Deutsche
Verlags-Anstalt, 1955; 2nd ed. 1963); all quotations taken from this book are from
the first edition.
87 Ibid., pp. 69-70.
•• Ibid., p. 70.
•• Ibid., p. 10.

218

JAMES A. WISEMAN

conscious of the fact that it is really a worldwide civilization,
and in this drawing together of the planet into the unity of a
single field of action the apparent ability to grasp at a glance
the task of ordering society on the entire planet and the
consciousness of having at one's disposal powerful means to
this end "raise the joys of planning to infinity." 39
If this sociological analysis is correct, then the Christian's
reaction to injustice in the world cannot but be affected. In
the past, writes Schillebeeckx, experiences of injustice led conscientious people to the ethical imperative of charitable deeds
in the private sphere of immediate interpersonal encounter.
But today,
in contrast with " medieval " man, we know that the social " establishment" is not a divine creation, but a cultural and man-made
situation which can be dealt with and reformed. Historical imperatives that now emerge from such ... experiences immediately
tackle the reform of the existing society itsel£.40
In other words, experiences of injustice now lead to involvement in the socio-economic and political fields. As an example
of this phenomenon Schillebeeckx several times refers to the
situation in post-war France where it became most obvious
that a reorganization of temporal affairs was needed and that
this was, among other things, a Christian duty. At this period
a sensitive theologian like M. D. Chenu was writing, for instance, that " today grace is struggling to find its whole
terrestrial dimension, in an economy where matter itself, in
man, is also redeemed." 41 Schillebeeckx concludes that, while
the theologian must be ever ready to point out all one-sidedness, it remains true that each age calls for its own proper
emphases. Today it seems that the Christian must stand on
•• Ibid., p. 77.
•• Schillebeeckx, "Church, Magisterium and Politics," God the Future of Man,
p. 155.
" M. D. Chenu, " L' 'homo oeconomicus' et le chretien," Economie et Humanisme (mai-juin 1945), p. 236, quoted by Schillebeeckx, "Cultuur en Godsdienst,"
Wereld en kerk, p. 17. Schillebeeckx's article first appeared in Kultuurleven, Xlli
(1946)' pp. !l'i!0-82.

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

219

the side of the great economic and political revolutions occurring all around him; the modern expression of Matthew's last
judgment scene would include references to help for developing
countries. 42
In embarking upon such work, "the Church's actual contribution can, of course, vary considerably-it may take the form
of encouragement and confirmation, help, collaboration or the
taking of initiatives. It may also consist of criticism and
protest." 43 It is this last contribution, that of criticism and
protest, which Schillebeeckx considers especially important.
Thus it is necessary to discuss the genesis, content, and various
phases of this ecclesial function, which he terms " critical
negativity."

II.

THE GENESIS,

CONTENT'

AND

vARlO US PHASES

OF CRITICAL NEGATIVITY

The Basic Meaning of Critical Negativity
As noted at the beginning of this article, Schillebeeckx
understands by " critical negativity" a positive function of the
Church by which it " continues to exert constant pressure [in
the secular sphere J in order to bring about a better world,
without humanity itself being sacrificed in the process." This
is essentially a " negative " function inasmuch as the positive
content of what is humanly desirable cannot be defined,
although mankind clearly has some negative knowledge of it:
In the long run, situations which are unworthy of man give rise
to explicit protest, not in the name of a concept of what would here
and now have been worthy of man which is already positively
defined, but in the name of human values still being sought, and
revealed in a negative manner in the ... experience of situations
unworthy of man. 44
•• Schillebeeckx, " Kerk en mensdom," W ereld en kerk, p. 156. This article first
appeared in Holland in Concilium., I (1965), pp. 63-83. Eng. trans.: " The Church
and Mankind," The Church and Mankind, ed. E. Schillebeeckx (" Concilium,"
Vol. I; Glen Rock, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1965), pp. 69-101.
•• "The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," God the Future of Man, p. 134.
""Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's Future on
Earth," God the Future of Man, p. 191.

220

JAMES A. WISEMAN

Schillebeeckx acknowledges his dependence on T. W.
Adorno's philosophical treatise, Negative Dialektik, 45 for the
term " critical negativity " but adds that in a different perspective-and one that seems closer to Schillebeeckx's ownthe expression had already been indirectly suggested to him
by Paul Ricoeur, among others, especially by that French
philosopher's article, "Taches de l'educateur politique." 46 Towards the end of this article Ricoeur writes that the health of
any collectivity rests ultimately on the right relationship between what the German sociologist Max Weber called the
ethic of conviction (Gesinnungsethik) and that of responsibility (Verantwortungsethik) .47 The former leads to unconditional devotion to an absolute, in which one does right without
asking what the consequences of the action will be, while the
latter leads to the taking of responsibility for one's action and
also for its foreseeable consequences; the V erantwortungsethik
is thus an ethic of force, of regulated balance, of calculated
culpability.
Accepting Weber's distinction, Ricoeur goes on to say that
the ethic of conviction is primarily carried forward by thinkers
and culture and-what is especially significant for Schillebeeckx's postion-the confessing communities, including the
churches, which find here rather than in politics properly socalled their point of insertion in the secular sphere. Unlike
Weber's" men of politics," the bearers of the ethic of conviction
act only indirectly in political matters, namely, by the constant
pressure which they bring to bear on the ethic of responsibility
and power. They are not bound to " the possible " and " the
reasonable " but rather to " the humanly desirable," the
•• Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1966.
•• Paul Ricoeur, "Taches de l'educateur politique,"
XXXIII (juillet-aout
1965)' pp. 78-93.
47 Ibid., p. 89.
Weber developed the distinction between these two ethics in
"Politik als Beruf," a speech at the University of Munich delivered in 1918 and
later published in his Gesammelte politische Schriften (Munich, 1921), pp. 396-450.
English trans.: "Politics as a Vocation," From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology,
trans. and ed. H. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1946), pp. 77-128.

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optimum ethic. Ricoeur writes that " if we take this ethic at
its highest point, as it is expressed in the Sermon on the Mount,
it becomes clear that the problem is not to bring this ethic to
immediate realization, but to express it indirectly by the whole
range of pressures it exerts upon the ethic of responsibility." 48

Critical Negativity as Derived from the Church's
Religious Mission
Before treating in some detail the corrective action which
the Church exercizes, one problem raised by Ricoeur's article
should be considered. As he notes, many groups exercize critical
functions toward society within the perspective of an ethic of
conviction. What, if anything, specifies the Church's contribution? This is an important question, for, as Schillebeeckx
writes, if in this or any other regard the Church " has no message
of her own to bring, a promise which the world cannot articu48 Ricoeur, p. 90. Ricoeur offers the utopia as an example of such indirect pressure
of the ethic of conviction. The utopia does seem to have an historical function in
the social order, for it alone can give to social, economic, or political action a human
vision, in fact a double vision: to will that humanity become a single whole, and
likewise to will the individual person as a whole. Regarding the former aspect,
Ricoeur claims that it is this vision of humanity taken as a single suffering and
aspiring being which lies at the horizon of all our debates about inequality in the
world, about the atomic threat, about decolonialization, or about the issue of a
"generalized economy." The second aspect of the utopian vision becomes particularly pressing in the face of the anonymity and dehumanization of relations among
individuals in industrial society. The barbarian forms of urbanization into which
we are plunged and the levelling of tastes and skills by the techniques of consumerism and the leisure industries make it clear to Ricoeur that man must fight
on two fronts: to bring together humanity, ever threatened with truncation into
rival groups, and to save each person from the anonymity in which he founders in
modem civilization.
The utopian vision, as one example of the way the ethic of conviction can be
formulated by the churches and other exponents of this ethic, does then, for Ricoeur,
have a definite function in the social order. He cautions, however, that such a
vision does not possess an efficacity of its own, but gains this only to the degree
that it gradually transforms the experience which we have at the institutional level.
This is why the utopia becomes a lie when it is not articulated on the possibilities
open to each epoch. We know, for example, that equality is right, but we also
know that an egalitarian society cannot be realized immediately but only by the
corrective action of what both Ricoeur and Schillebeeckx see as the constant
pressure of the ethic of conviction upon the ethic of responsibility.

JAMES A. WISEMAN

late for us, then she indeed has no further reason for existing." 49 But in fact, he argues, the Church's critical role springs
directly from her specifically religious mission, and that in both
its aspects: the evangelical or directly religious aspect, and
the derivative one of commitment to what Schillebeeckx,
borrowing Paul Tillich's terminology, calls the world's "direct
concerns," which the Church considers in the light of her
message about the "ultimate concern" of human life. 5°
In considering the Church's critical function insofar as it
is derived from the directly religious aspect of her mission, it
should first be recalled that this aspect consists essentially of
the Church's proclamation of the mystery of God and the
consequent revelation to man of the mystery that he himself is.
Schillebeeckx quotes approvingly the statement from Gaudium
et spes that " since it has been entrusted to the Church to
reveal the mystery of God, who is the ultimate goal of man,
she opens up to man at the same time the meaning of his own
existence, that is, the innermost truth about himself." 51 Or,
as is stated elsewhere in this same conciliar document, the
Church, relying on the inspiration of Christ, proposes to speak
to all men in order to unfold the mystery that is man, to shed
light on such fundamental questions as: " What is man? What
is the meaning of suffering, evil and death which have not been
eliminated by all this program? . . . What happens after this
earthly life is ended?" 52
Such questions about the meaning of existence are being
49 Schillebeeckx, " Secularization
and Christian Belief in God," God the Future
of Man, p. 79.
50 Schillebeeckx, "The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," ibid., p. 133.
51 Gaudium et spes, n. 41, quoted ibid., pp. 133-34.
52 Gaudium et spes, n. 10, quoted ibid., p. 135. It may be noted that Professor
John E. Smith of Yale University, in his book Experience and God (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1968) , points out in several places this essential concern
of religion with questions about the purpose and meaning of life: " This [religious]
dimension marks man as the religious animal in the sense that he is the one being
in whom the question of the purpose of existence as such becomes explicit both as a
question and as a supreme interest" (p. 53). Or again: "The reality of God from
the religious standpoint means the answering of the question about the ground and
purpose of human life " (p. 64) .

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raised with great urgency and frequency today. In seeking the
reasons for this, Schillebeeckx notes that Ricoeur, among
others, has often pointed to the fact that our era's massive
technical improvement, however useful and necessary it may
be, remains on the level of the instrumental, the level of means
and the subordinate meanings of human life. This whole process
has accordingly been accompanied by an obscuring of ultimate
meaning and values, with the result that " it is precisely this
self-made, more and more manipulated world which causes
[man's] anxiety." 53
Furthermore, as writers like Freyer have observed, man has
begun to plan not only the material world as a whole but himself as well, thereby increasing the danger of coming to regard
himself as a being of no ultimate value, as merely a part in an
overriding scheme of means ordered to purely calculable ends.
Even assuming that all of men's material, psychic, and social
needs have been met, Schillebeeckx writes, there would still
remain the question: "And what now?" 54 This question
derives from the mystery that is man himself and asks for the
very meaning of his existence, a question which is implicit in
every other need. The greatest danger for our Western civilization is that we think that through science we will clear up
the mystery" man." To counter this danger, the Church must
not only continue " bearing witness to, expressing, proclaiming
and commemorating in grateful celebration the inexpressible
mystery from which this world may live, unconsciously, thanks
to Christ's life, death and resurrection," 55 but she must alsoand here resides the critical side of this aspect of her missionprotest against ideologies which underlie man's work for a better
world on earth when she knows that these ideologies have an
inadequate concept of man's deepest being. The Church is, after
58 Schillebeeckx, " Secularization
and Christian Belief in God," God the Future
of Man, p. 63.
5 ' " Sociale structuren,
maatschappelijk werk en charitas," W ereld en kerk, p. 213.
This article was first reproduced by stencil in 1962 and was reworked in 1965 for
the International Congress for Social Work, held in Santiago, Spain.
55 " Secularization and Christian Belief in God, God the Future of Man, pp. 83-84.

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JAMES A. WISEMAN

all, convinced that whenever man (or society) gives himself over,
with " ultimate concern " and therefore in an unconditional surrender, to objects which are not in fact capable of corresponding
to his deepest desires, he will remain dissatisfied, unfulfilled and
isolated, and the human person will suffer a loss of integrity. 56

It is, then, in this prophetic protest against all false gods,
against the idols to which man is tempted to give his ultimate
allegiance, that the first aspect of the Church's function of
critical negativity consists.

Critical Negativity as Emanating from the Derivative
Aspect of the Church's Mission
Since, in her dialogue with the secular world, the Church
not only elucidates the ultimate meaning of human life but also
commits herself to the " direct concerns " of this world, she
must exercize her critical function in this latter area as well.
Here, for example in documents like Gaudium et spes and Pope
Paul's encyclical on the development of peoples, Populorum
progressio, the Church makes statements which must to a large
extent be based on non-theological information, that is, on the
analysis of secular situations. And because the Church as such
has no special competence for such analyses, she must in fulfilling this task let herself be guided by the autonomous laws of
this world's structures. 57 In other words,
the Church cannot fulfill this prophetic [that is, this " critical and
constructive "] task with regard to the secular problems of man and
society purely in the light of revelation: she must also listen to the
" foreign prophecy " addressed to her from the secular situation,
urging her to take decisions which will help to shape the future. 58
She must, for instance, be attuned to the writings of those who
are trying to explain how changes in society have come and are
still coming about. Among such works, Schillebeeckx more
than once singles out Freyer's Theorie des gegenwiirtigen
56

"The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," ibid., p. 134.

•• Ibid., p. 135.
•• Ibid., p. 136.

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Zeitalters; The Sociological Imagination, by the late American
sociologist, C. Wright Mills; The Political Theory of Progressive
Individualism: Hobbes to Locke, by the English scholar C. B.
Macpherson; One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology
of Advanced Industrial Society, by Herbert Marcuse, professor
of philosophy at the University of California at San Diego;
"and, of course, The New Sociology, Essays in Social Science
and Social Theory (in honor of C. W. Mills), edited by I.
Horowitz." 59
In discussing the manner in which these and other-by no
means always written and published-" voices of worldly
prophecy" influence the formation of the Church's own social
imperatives, Schillebeeckx stresses that this is, in the first
place, not a matter of theoretical formulation or theological
expression on the part of the Church. Commenting upon the
Second Vatican Council's declaration that the Church always
has "the duty of scrutinizing the signs of the times and of
interpreting them in the light of the Gospel," 60 he writes that
past experience shows that this cannot refer to a theoretical
interpretation, for then the decisions which should shape the
future would generally come too late: "Ethical imperatives
have seldom been discovered by philosophers, theologians or
the ecclesiastical magisterium. They arise spontaneously out
of the concrete secular experiences of life; they impose themselves with the evidence of experience." 61
In different terminology, the Church's social imperatives
arise from what Schillebeeckx calls " contrast-experiences,"
those experiences which evoke the protest "No! It can't go
on like this; we won't stand for it any longer! " 62 Examples of
such experiences which he gives are those of the two World
Wars, the concentration camps, the color-bar, the developing
59 " Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's Future on
Earth," God the Future of Man, p. 204, n. S. See also "Church, Magisterium and
Politics," ibid., p. 165, n. 18.
•• Gaudium et spes, n. 4.
61 "The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," God the Future of Man, p. 187.
62 Ibid., p. 186.

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JAMES A. WISEMAN

countries, the hungry, the homeless, the underprivileged, and
the poor in countries where there is so much potential wealth. 63
In all these experiences he finds an implied awareness of values
which is positive, though veiled and not yet articulate. The
absence of" what ought to be" is what is experienced initially,
and this leads first to protest and then to a perhaps vague,
yet real, perception of" what should be done here and now." 64
He concludes an admittedly " terse and incomplete analysis "
in the following way:
What is called for is not only, nor even primarily, a reflexive
dialogue, but rather the existential involvement of Christians in the
world, a " presence au monde." This does not imply complicity
with the world, but a saving Christian presence, the forerunner of
that hope in a "new heaven and a new earth," a hope which
revolutionizes our efforts for a better future on earth. 65
In this passage's reference to the Christian hope for a" a new
heaven and a new earth" can be seen Schillebeeckx's conviction
that the formulations of protest by which the Church responds
to the voices of worldly prophecy are drawn up in the name
of her utopian vision based on eschatological hope. As he said
in one of his American lectures, it is the Church's "utopian"
view which is the standard of her criticism, the " utopian "
urge of the Gospel which provokes her prophetic protest against
any curtailment of the possibilities of man's existence, while
this urge is itself grounded " in her hope of that promised future
which starts already modestly in the history of this world as
salvation history." 66 The Christian is not simply seeking what
is humanly desirable, something unknown; he knows, in his
eschatological faith, that the God of the promise has bound
himself to the realization of this in Christ, even though the
Christian cannot formulate the content of this promise m a
positive way. 67 In other words,
63 "

Church, Magisterium and Politics," ibid., p. 154.

"'Ibid.
••" The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," ibid., pp. 137-38.
••" Church, Magisterium and Politics," ibid., p. 159.
The New Image of God, Secularization and Jl.'lan's Future on
•• "Epilogue:
Earth," ibid., p. 191.

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in opposition to everything which would diminish the possibilities
of humanity, Christian faith in the eschaton continues to play a
critically negative part and, with regard to the building up of a
truly human future, the same eschatological hope still says that
the humanly impossible is made really possible in Jesus the Christ. 68

The Content of the Church's Social Protest
In this opposition of the Church " to everything which would
diminish the possibilities of humanity," she is, according to
Schillebeeckx, above all obliged never to allow man to rest
content with any "establishment."
As he explains it, the
Christian hope for a " new world " relativizes every earthly
result of man's work of humanization, for no result attained
can yet be this " new world." In the past Christians often
drew from this fact the false conclusion that they should stand
opposed or indifferent to the building up of a better world, but
in fact the only correct conclusion is that Christianity can
never rest satisfied with any " established order " on earth.
There is no definitively " Christian culture " or " Christian
social order." The Christian element is precisely the continual
transcending of the achieved result, the refusal to say: Now
is the good finally attained. 69 As Schillebeeckx says elsewhere,
"in a political society, the Christian expectation and the
Sermon on the Mount play the part of an effective ' utopia '
which will keep on exercizing an ever-present pressure on all
social and political matters." 70
This " utopia " is thus the permanent source of criticism of
•• Ibid., p. 193.
••" Christelijk geloof en aardse toekomstverwachting," De zending van de kl'!T'k,
pp. 69-70. In the same vein, he said in one of the American lectures that "the
Gospel message of Christian expectation offers the stimulating possibility constantly
to overcome the limitations of any present 'establishment.' It contains a permanent
criticism of the actual situation: secular institutions, social structures and their
dominant mentality. It urges constant improvement, and above all, it brings the
finn conviction that this building up of a more human world is genuinely possible "
("Church, Magisterium and Politics," God the Future of Man, p. 157).
70 " Church,
Magisterium and Politics," God the Future of Man, p. 158. This
is similar to Ricoeur's description, referred to above, of the Sermon on the Mount
as one of the highest expressions of the ethic of conviction.

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JAMES A. WISEMAN

all structures of life on earth, allowing no existing situation to
pretend to be already the realization of " the Christian order "
or "the humanly desirable." The Christian's eschatological
faith will condemn every left-wing political effort to give a
positive and definitive name to what is worthy of man, just as,
on the other hand, it will condemn all right-wing political
tendencies which give an absolute value to the " established
order " and rationalize it as a pattern of temporal society which
has been sanctioned by the "eternal" God. 71 Finally, "eschatological faith also implies a criticism of every attempt which,
purely on the basis of scientific and technological planning,
claims to be able to realize a perfect future for the whole of
mankind." 72
In addition to this critique of every " establishment," a
vigorous defense of human freedom is also demanded of the
Church. She must protest against all threats to this freedom,
which is not only a good in itself but also the human basis for
Christianity. Those who, for example, live a colorless existence
in a large city, in an atmosphere which again and again eliminates the higher desires, lack the fundamental condition for
Christianity-genuine freedom, which must always contain the
possibility of self-distancing over against one's situation. 73 In
71 "Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's Future on
Earth," ibid., p. 192.
72 Ibid., p. 193.
The contemporary German theologian Johannes B. Metz, to
whose writings Schillebeeckx several times refers, has expressed similar thoughts
on the relation of Christian eschatology to the Church's critique of society. He
writes, for example, that Christianity's " eschatological proviso does not mean
that the present condition of society is not valid. It is valid, but only in the
' eschatological meanwhile.' " This proviso brings about " a critical attitude to the
societal present. Its promises are not an empty horizon of religious expectations;
neither are they only a regulative idea. They are, rather, a critical liberating
imperative for our present times. These promises stimulate and appeal to us to
make them a reality in the present historical condition" ("The Church and the
World in the Light of a 'Political Theology,'" Theology of the World, trans.
William Glen-Doepel [New York: Herder and Herder, 1969], p. 114; original
edition: Zur Theologie der Welt [Mainz: Matthias-Griinewald-Verlag, 1968]).
73 " Op zoek naar Gods afwezigheid," W ereld en kerk, p. 56.
This article first
appeared in Kultuurleven, XXIV (1957), pp. 276-91. See also " Het kerkelijk
apostolaat in verband met de situatie 1945-1954," Wereld en kerk, p. 92.

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a milieu marked by misery and tumultuous labor, where all
kinds of propaganda are at work, it becomes in the long run
impossible to stand open to the sacramental preaching of the
Church. For her own sake as well as for the sake of man
himself, the Church must accordingly speak out against the
threats to man's freedom and personhood posed by the increasing "rationalization" of modem society. 74
71 Here again the Church must first listen to the " voices of worldly prophecy "
in order properly to grasp the threat of " rationalization." As understood by Max
Weber, the German sociologist who did pioneering work in this field until his death
in 1920, the term "rationalization" (or "rationalism") refers to a process common
to all civilizations but particularly pronounced in the West, so pronounced that
Weber could speak of the "peculiar rationalism of Western culture" (The
Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, trans. Talcott Parsons [New York:
Charles Scribner's Sons, 1980), p. 26). Although he admitted that the term could
be used to refer to a number of things, in general he used it to signify " an
increasing theoretical mastery of reality by means of increasingly precise and
abstract concepts" ("The Social Psychology of the World Religions," From Max
Weber: Essays in Sociology, trans. and ed. H. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills [New
York: Oxford University Press, 1946), p. 298).
In the West, Weber saw this process of rationalization as reaching its present
highest point in the modern world's highly organized bureaucratic capitalism.
Admitting that bureaucracy, taken merely as a form of administration and judged
solely by such criteria as precision, speed, uniformity of operation, and reduction
of frictions, was superior to all previous forms, he nevertheless saw in " the rule of
an uncontrolled bureaucracy" the threat of the dissolution of man's freedom:
"The living machine of the bureaucratic organization, with its specialization, ...
its regimentation, and its authoritarian structure--this living machine also is
' objectified mind.' Combined with the inanimate machine it would create a new
bondage, . . . a framework into which people might be forced to fit as helplessly
as the fellahs who had to accept the old Egyptian society " (" Parlament und
Regierung im neugeordneten Deutschland.
I. Die Erbschaft Bismarcks," Gesammelte politische Schriften [Munich, 1921), pp. 155 ff., quoted by Fred H. Blum,
"Max Weber: The Man of Politics and the Man Dedicated to Objectivity and
Rationality," Ethics, LXX [1959-60], p. 7) .
Weber has been followed in this analysis of the effects of rationalization by other
sociologists to whom Schillebeeckx often refers. Herbert Marcuse, whose OneDimensional Man is considered by Schillebeeckx to be the kind of sociological
analysis which " is a conditio sine qua non for the overcoming of the limitations
of the ' established order ' " (Schillebeeckx, " Epilogue: The New Image of God,
Secularization and Man's Future on Earth," God the Future of Man, p. 206),
studies in this book the manner in which " independence of thought, autonomy,
and the right to political opposition are being deprived of their basic critical
function in a society which seems increasingly capable of satisfying the needs of the

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JAMES A. WISEMAN

The Phase of "More Concrete Plans" and
the Need to Carry Them Out
Beyond such protest, which for Schillebeeckx constitutes a
first phase in the Church's contrast-experiences, there comes a
second phase, " where the message of the Gospel matures
through a combination of theology and the scientific analysis
of a particular situation into a responsible and more concrete
plan of social and political action." 75 It is not a matter of the
Church's proposing merely "general principles" for social and
political issues. For Schillebeeckx, the real contribution of such
encyclicals as Pacem in ferris and Populorum progressio lies in
their authors' recognition of this and their consequent willingness to "deal really with definite moral decisions (though
obviously against a background of basic principles already
gained from past experiences)." 76
It is, in fact, precisely in the ability of the Church to
formulate what needs to be done in concrete, definite terms
that Schillebeeckx sees the primary value of the Church's intervention. The basic obligation to obey such ecclesiastical directives does indeed arise from the situation itself, which imposes
a human duty that " ought to stir the Christian conscience
even before any official pronouncement. The Church's interindividuals through the way in which it is organized" (One-Dimensional Man:
Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society [Boston: Beacon Press,
The very efficiency of this
1964], p. I), that is, through its "rationalization."
system blunts the individual's recognition that it contains no . facts which do not
communicate the repressive power of the whole, a power " repressive precisely to
the degree to which it promotes the satisfaction of needs which require continuing
the rat race of catching up with one's peers and with planned obsolescence, enjoying freedom from using one's brain, working with and for the means of destruction "
(ibid., p. !'l41)
A similar indictment of the rationalized organization of society is to be found in
the work of the late C. Wright Mills, for whom the guiding principles of such
organization were alien to and in contradiction with all that has been historically
understood as individuality (C. Wright Mills, The Sociological Imagination [New
York: Oxford University Press, 1959], pp. 170-71).
75 Schillebeeckx, "Church,
Magisterium and Politics," God the Future of Man,
p. 159.
70 Ibid., p. 156.
0

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vention merely confirms this. The specific character of such an
intervention lies in the fact that this demand is formulated in
a clear, precise, concrete and definite sense (e. g., in this
situation the breaking up of vast landed properties by expropriation is morally necessary) ." 77
Finally, and perhaps most importantly of all, the Church's
protests and directives must actually become embodied in
action undertaken by members of the Church working in
cooperation with all men of good will. As Schillebeeckx said in
a lecture given in Rome in 1964 and entitled simply "Church
and World,"" it is a matter not of the loud proclamation that
love is all, but of an actual, concerned involvement with
men." 78 The question of just who is responsible for the proclamation of the Church's protests and who for their implementation is the subject of the following section of this
article.

III.

THE BEARERS OF THE FuNCTION OF CRITICAL NEGATIVITY

The Nature of the Distinction between Clergy and Laity
If, as Schillebeeckx holds, the two phases of (1) criticizing
society by the standard of her" utopian" view and (2) applying this view to society through " a responsible and more
concrete plan of social and political action " constitute a
function which holds for the Church as such and which must
furthermore be embodied ultimately in concrete deeds, the
question arises as to what division of labor, if any, is appropriate for the carrying out of this function. In particular, what
is the significance of the traditional distinction between clergy
and laity in this regard?
In answering this question, it is first of all important to
stress that, for Schillebeeckx, it is fundamentally non-ecclesial
to see all expressions of one's churchliness in the perspective of
this distinction. To do so severs the mystery of the one body
77

Ibid., p. 162.
Kerk en wereld," W ereld en kerk, p. 135.

78 "

JAMES A. WISEMAN

of Christ and leads to the false notion that there are " two
sorts of Christians " to be distinguished in the Church: those
whose proper sphere of action is the Church itself (clerics), and
those whose domain is the world (laymen). To avoid this, all
emphasis must be placed on the communal basis of Christianity
as such, which cannot be expressed in terms of laity and
clergy. 79 The consecratio mundi, for example, is one important
task for the Church, but in itself it is neither lay nor clerical
but simply Christian. The relationship to the temporal from
out of the community of grace plays no role in the differentiation between clergy and laity; it is a charge of being a Christian.80 If there are these large areas in the Church where the
difference between laity and clergy plays no direct role, the
question then becomes: Where does this difference begin and
where does it end? What is its Sitz im Leben? 81
Just as Schillebeeckx understands the Church itself above
all in terms of its relationship to Christ (as sacrament of the
risen Christ), so too he finds the essence of Church office, and
hence the Sitz im Leben of the distinction between clergy and
laity, in the relationship of office-bearers to Christ. As we
read in Ephesians, Jesus is distinct from his body, the Church,
as its head: the Father " has put all things under his feet and
has given him, raised above all, as head to the Church " (Eph.
1: flfl-fl3) . There is, then, a certain identity between Christ and
79 " Het kerkelijk apostolaat
in verband met de situatie 1945-1954," Wereld en
kerk, pp. 106-07.
80 " Dogmatiek
van ambt en lekestaat," De zending van de kerk, p. 117. This
article first appeared in Tijdschrift voor Theologie, II (1962), pp. 258-92.
81 Ibid., p. 107. In the discussion which follows, the term "hierarchy"
is to be
understood in a broad sense, as synonymous with " clergy " and " bearers of office."
Such equivalence of all three texms in the writings of Schillebeeckx is illustrated
very clearly in the following passage: " Men have sought diligently for the place
of the layman in the Church, as though that were the real point of issue. But
in terms of biblical theology the question lies in precisely the opposite direction:
What is the place of office in the ecclesial people of God? From the point of view
of the Bible the negative definition that a layman is a non-cleric is perplexing.
Such a definition is understandable only from out of a past where Church and
hierarchy were practically identified" (" Terugblik en synthese," De zending van
de kerk, p. 157) .

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his Church, but such that he is at the same time distinct from
it as its principle of life and its leader. 82
In the visible Church this aspect of Christ as head, founder,
and leader of the Church is, through God's institution, represented precisely in the apostolic office, the core of which thus
lies in its being a visible manifestation of Christ's mediation
between the Father and the Church. Church office renders
present this one aspect of Christ; just as he as head and
mediator is differentiated from the Church and so stands over
against it, so too the ecclesial office is a function through which
the bearer of that office in his official acts formally stands over
against the People of God as their leader. In the two phrases
" in the name of Christ " and " over against the People of
God " lies the proper basis for the difference between the clergy
and the laity; only in this relationship to the office is the
People of God to be called " lay." 83
More specifically, the clergy manifests the guiding and teaching authority as a principle of order and, through the power of
consecration, as the principle that constitutes the ecclesial character of the sacramental and cultic life. 84 Or, in terms of the
"lines of force" in the Church's office of leadership which
Schillebeeckx has schematically outlined, the bearers of Church
office are entrusted with leading and guiding the life of the
community of believers in such a way that Christ may really
be their only Lord, directing the ministry of the Word in faithfulness to the apostolic confession of faith, conducting the
sacramental services of the community, and providing the
"consolation of the Gospel" through admonition and exhortation.85
••" Dogmatiek van ambt en lekestaat," p. 112.
•• Ibid., pp. 112-13.
•• Ibid., p. 117.
•• " The Catholic Understanding of Office in the Church," Theological Studies,
XXX (1969), p. 572.

234

JAMES A. WISEMAN

The Clergy's Role in the Church's Critique of the
Temporal Order
While the clerical functions just mentioned derive from the
first aspect of the Church's mission, the evangelical, the clergy
are not thereby relieved of any part in the secondary, though
still essential, aspect of her mission, namely, the Christian
influencing of the temporal order where this affects human
existence: "The Church's office of leadership also implies
leading in the love that desires and seeks to attain justice for
all men-in other words, being responsible for the evangelical
care which the community must have for man in his concrete
historical situation." '" This task includes not only a critical
attitude towards possible failures of the community itself in
this regard but also "a critique of society as a whole," for
inasmuch as the bearers of office do in fact represent the community of believers in the presence of the world, " what is
living in the community will crystallize out in their person,"
and this may well include the whole community's" critical no"
to the world. 87 In its expression, this function of critical
negativity is accordingly a properly clerical or hierarchical one,
whereby the bearers of office " let the authoritative voice of
the church community be heard in the guidance of humanity
towards a better, more humane world." 88
•• Ibid.
87 Ibid.
88 " The Church as the Sacrament
of Dialogue," God the Future of Man, p. 137.
In terminology somewhat different from that of Schillebeeckx, Johannes B. Metz
supplements this view of why it is above all the hierarchy which must actually
voice the Church's " critical no " to society, which de facto sees in the bearers of
office the authoritative voice of the institutional Church. Metz writes that, if faith
is formed by the eschatalogieal promises, it " again and again takes on a critical
task with regard to the society in which the faithful live. . . . The question now
is: Can this task be left to the individual believer? Will he be able to perform it
authoritatively and effectively? Is it not, therefore, precisely this critical task of
faith which, in a new way, raises the problem of institutionalizing faith?" ("The
Church and the World in the Light of a 'Political Theology,'" Theology of the
World, p. 115). Or again, it is a question of" whether and how critical freedom is
at all possible without institutionalization, if it is to gain the maximum force and
efficacy for its task of criticizing society " (" On the Institution and Institutionalization," ibid., p. 133) .

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

285

Schillebeeckx notes that in the past the hierarchy was often
not aware of its responsibility in this area but feels that in such
documents as Pacem in terris and Populorum progressio one
finds the beginning of a new self-awareness in the magisterium:
In them a new self-understanding of ecclesiastical office comes into
view, for in social and political issues the ecclesiastical authorities
no longer seek merely to safeguard humanity's ethical past achievements; they seek rather to let the authoritative voice of the Church
community be heard in the guidance of humanity towards a better,
more humane world-which, for the faith and hope of Christians,
can truly be called an ascent, in Christ, towards the definitive
kingdom. 89

In his treatment of this ecclesial function in " Church, Magisterium and Politics," Schillebeeckx turns finally to the question
of the morally binding force of the Church's magisterial pronouncements in social and political matters. Asking whether
the magisterium can guarantee the faithful that its prescription
on any such issue is the only right one, he replies that this
cannot be maintained in an absolute sense simply because
concrete decisions in the field of politics are not amenable to
that degree of certainty. 90 Nevertheless, he continues, the
Christian's belie£ that the Church stands under the guidance
of the Spirit does give him a moral certainty that by acting in
accordance with such directives he" will really act more in line
with what the situation demands, and that [he] can therefore
89 " The Church as the Sacrament of Dialogue," God the Future of Man, p. 187.
Although Schillebeeckx himself dwells at no great length on past failures of the
clergy in their critical function, one of the sociologists to whom he refers most
frequently, the late C. Wright Mills, did do so, particularly in "A Pagan Sermon to
the Christian Clergy" (The Nation, CLXXXVI [Jan.-June 1958], pp. 199-202).
After complaining that religion, as a social and personal force, had become a
" dependent variable," reacting rather than originating, adapting rather than
denouncing, imitating rather than setting forth new models of conduct and
sensibility, Mills called upon the Christian clergy " to proclaim gospel, to declare
justice, to apply your love of man-the sons of God, all of them, you say-meaningfully, each and every day, to the affairs and troubles of men. It is up to you
to find answers that are rooted in ultimate moral decisions and to say them out
so that they are compelling." (p. 202)
90 " Church, Magisterium
and Politics," God the Future of Man, p. 168.

236

JAMES A. WISEMAN

face the consequences of such an action more confidently, even
if it should lead to complications." 91
This in turn "leads us to the specific nature of the obligatory
quality of these official directives," which Schillebeeckx sees
as residing above all in the negative character of the Church's
concrete moral imperatives, growing as they do mainly out of
contrast-experiences-" This cannot go on." 92 Such protests
can exert real pressure towards overcoming all limitations of
man's capabilities and towards raising his activity up to " the
highest human level-a level which cannot be defined, the
maximum level which transcends all human expectations." 93
He grants that
the fact that this distinctively Christian contribution to the building up of a temporal society really worthy of man is critically
negative-although it is based on a positive hope-may perhaps
make it appear insignificant. But it should not be underestimated.
The basic question, after all, is whether what is "humanly desirable " can-again and again-be so easily recognized without a
critical function. And from where else would this come, if not from
the faith that God is man's future? ... It is ... nowhere apparent
from history-apart from God's promise-whether what is worthy
of man is ultimately at all possible. 94

It is, in other words, the dynamism of Christian hope straining
towards an absolute future which precludes our being left with
a principle which, arising from social and cultural factors alone
and so lacking this unique Christian dynamism, would limit
what is "humanly desirable" in advance. 95
Ibid.
Ibid., p. 164.
93 " Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's Future on
Earth," ibid., p. 194.
94 Ibid. On this same point, Metz writes:
" There is a negative, critical attitude
and experience to which we should pay our chief attention: the experience of the
threat to humanity, that is, the experience of freedom, justice, and peace being
threatened. We should not underestimate this negative experience. . . . The
solidarity which grows out of this experience offers the possibility of a common
front of protest. This must be grasped; this must be exploited" (" The Church
and the World in the Light of a 'Political Theology,'" Theology of the World,
pp. 123-24).
95 Schillebeeckx, " Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's
Future on Earth," p. 197.
91

92

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

237

The Laity's Role in the Function of Critical Negativity
If the responsibility of bringing to expression the Church's
" critical no " to society devolves primarily upon her officebearers, this is by no means to imply that the laity have no
role or a merely negligible one in the function of critical
negativity. This is a function of the whole Church, and the
laity's role lies first of all in helping the office-bearers formulate
their critique. Schillebeeckx considers such assistance to be
indispensable, for in determining the best socio-economic or
political order it is not just a matter of consulting those revealed principles or basic human values which the Church in
her magisterium and pastoral office must safeguard but of
expertly interpreting the de facto world situation and of technically analyzing this, and for this the hierarchy, at least as such,
has no special mission or competence. 96 This temporal assessment therefore " belongs per se not to the competence of the
ecclesiastical hierarchy, but to the Christian laity." 97 Moreover, the clergy must listen to the voice of the laity as the
voice not only of expert advisors " but of children of God
living out of the Spirit of Christ, as the voice of believers in
whom (and insofar as!) the Good News and the Scriptures
have taken concrete form and who as such constitute a ' locus
theologicus,' a living tradition of faith." 98
As an example of the way in which clergy and laity can work
together in these matters Schillebeeckx refers to the various
stages in the composition of Gaudium et spes. Up through the
third session of the Council the various drafts of this document
were judged by many to be deficient in their " Christian anthropology,'' largely because those responsible for these drafts were
caught up in too static and individualistic a vision of man.
These drafts were also criticized because their picture of " the
world " remained too " medieval," as though the world were
merely a means for the exercise of Christian charity with no
•• "Kerk en wereld," Wereld en kerk, p. 136.
97 " Het kerkelijk apostolaat in verband met de situatie 1945-1954," ibid., p. 110.
98 Dogmatiek van arnbt m lekestaat,"
De zending van de kerk, p. 1ft0.

JAMES A. WISEMAN

value of its own. With these criticisms before him, Bishop
Guano, the president of the drafting commission, took the
initiative of greatly enlarging the membership of his commission, not just with clerics but with many more laymen than
before. In the period between the third and fourth sessions this
group worked diligently on a new draft, and it was this which,
with some more or less basic modifications, was finally approved by the Council as its Pastoral Constitution on the
Church in the Modern World. 99
Another and equally important task for the laity arises from
Schillebeeckx's insistence that "it is a matter not of the loud
proclamation that love is all, but of an actual, concerned involvement with men." This involvement includes the application to particular cases of the " more concrete plans " which the
Church's contrast-experiences engender, and for Schillebeeckx
this application is a task for the laity, one which they carry out
"in a properly lay manner, namely, just insofar as they are
daily involved in earthly matters, such that they, not magisterially or pastorally, as the clergy, but fully involved in the
things of this world, are able to direct them as it were from
within towards sanctification." 100
Christianity is, then, for Schillebeeckx a matter no more for
the clergy than for the laity. Both groups have their own particular tasks, their own " spiritual gifts," all of which are necessary if the Church is properly to fulfill its function of critical
negativity as well as all other aspects of its mission. To conclude the expositional part of this article with the words of
Schillebeeckx himself in a synthesis of his thought on the
relationship between clergy and laity and on the great good
that comes from their harmonious work together, it is for him
precisely out of the mutual relationship of the clergy and laity's
diverse " spiritual gifts " that " the body of the Church, as the
community of faith, love, and eschatological hope, is being
•• " Christelijk geloof en aardse toekomstverwachting," ibid., p. 47.
De typologische definitie van de christelijke leek volgens Vaticanum II,"
ibid., p. 146.
100 "

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

gradually built up in this world until the day comes when
the community of mankind grows into ' the communion of
saints.' " 101

IV.

CRITICAL

REFLECTIONS

oN ScHILLEBEECKX's

PosiTION

Some Inconsistencies and Modifications in his Thought
The Church does, then, for Schillebeeckx have a message of
her own to bring to the world, a contribution one of whose
many forms is that of critical negativity, of prophetic protest
" against every image of man whose lines are strictly drawn or
which presents itself as a positive and total definition and
against the illusory expectation that science and technology are
capable of solving the ultimate problems of man's existence." 102
In evaluating his thought on this particular ecclesial function
it is first of all important to realize that, while his use of the
term "critical negativity" is relatively recent, the function
itself and related subjects (such as the relationship between
clergy and laity) were treated by him in lectures and articles
of much earlier date, something which helps make understandable certain inconsistencies in these works. In the Introduction
to W ereld en kerk Schillebeeck.x himself notes that the fact
that the articles included in this collection were written over a
span of twenty years enables them " to provide a picture o£
the growth in this problematic [of ' world and Church '] since
the last World War"; 103 if the material treated in these articles
were now to be recast into a unified whole, this very growth
would call for certain revisions, especially in the earlier writings. We have seen, for example, that in a recent synthesis of
his thought on the clergy-laity relationship Schillebeeckx claims
that, from a Scriptural point of view, it is "perplexing" to
define a layman negatively as a " non-cleric." Such a definition,
Terugblik en synthese," ibid., p. 163.
Schillebeeckx, "Epilogue: The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's
Future on Earth," God the Future of Man, pp. 193-94.
103 "Ten geleide," Wereld en kerk, p. 10.
101 "

102

240

JAMES A. WISEMAN

he adds, " is understandable only from out of a past where
Church and hierarchy were practically identified." 104 But at
least as late as 1954 the influence of that past was still to be
felt in his own writings. Discussing in that year the actual
carrying out of societal reforms called for by the Church, he
wrote that such reforms " must be the proper task of laymen
competent in this field. Here only the laity, not the hierarchical
Church, can extend the positive construction. The Church does
indeed have a social inspiration, but the concrete application
of this to specific situations falls outside her competence." 105
The doubtless unintentional omission of an adjective modifying
the word " Church " in the last of these sentences reveals that
tendency to identify the Church with the hierarchy to which
Schillebeeckx elsewhere rightly objects.
Much more significant is the fact that Schillebeeckx has over
the years altered his manner of distinguishing the clergy from
the laity. In an article first published in 1958 he noted that
Christians have a positive obligation to invest the temporal
order with meaning, adding that " the Church as an institution
of salvation, and therefore the ecclesiastical hierarchy as well,
has only a supernatural mission; this [temporal] obligation is
not hers. But the Church is also the laity, the community of
the faithful, which belongs to this world as well, in which it has
at the same time an earthly obligation to fulfill, one with a
directly earthly goal: the humanization of the world and of
man." 106 Far different from this emphasis on an exclusively
supramundane mission of the hierarchy is the approach taken
in an article published only four years later, where Schillebeeckx stresses that dedication to the building up of a better
world in incumbent upon all Christians, both lay and clerical:
" The relation to the temporal order from out of a graced
Terugblik en synthese," De zending van de kerk, p. 157.
Het kerkelijk apostolaat in verband met de situatie 1945-1954," Wereld en
kerk, p. 110.
106 "Het katholieke
ziekenhuis en de katholieke gezondheidszorg," ibid., p. 217.
This article first appeared in Ons Ziekenhuis, XX (1958), pp. 317-25 and in
Hospitalia, IV (1959), pp. 29-35.
104 "

105 "

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

241

communion with God plays no role in distinguishing between
clerics and laymen; it is one of the obligations simply of being
a Christian." 107
Underestimation of the Demands of Dialogue
If this exemplifies a development which has already occurred
in Schillebeeckx's thought, there are other aspects of even his
recent work which seem inadequate and so in need of modification. While he does see that the Church must formulate
her moral decisions in the light of extensive and intensive
dialogue with the " voices of worldly prophecy," his appraisal
of an encyclical like Populorum progressio suggests that he
may underestimate just how demanding this dialogue must be.
Schillebeeckx is doubtless correct in regarding this encyclical
as one indication "of a new self-understanding on the part of
the Church's magisterium," 108 of a willingness to " deal really
with definite moral decisions." 109 As is pointed out by Dr. Philipp Herder-Dorneich, the transition in recent social encyclicals
from comprehensive pronouncements to special directives and
admonitions was only logical in an increasingly complex world
where no problem exists everywhere in quite the same cast. 110
Like Schillebeeckx, he emphasizes that this new focus on
specific situations calls for much specialized knowledge and
that such knowledge does not just happen but is the fruit o£
hard work by a host of thinkers, practical men and experts:
" the greater the number of people involved in this process, the
better the chance for satisfactory results." 111 But in this
emphasis he seems to be considerably more realistic than the
Dutch theologian. While Schillebeeckx's appraisal of PopuDogmatiek van ambt en lekestaat," De zending van de kerk, p. 117.
"Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's Future on
Earth," God the Future of Man, p. 203.
109 " Church, Magisterium
and Politics," ibid., p. 156.
110 Philipp
Herder-Dorneich, "How Can the Church Provide Guidelines in
Social Ethics? " The Social Message of the Gospels, ed. Franz BOckle (" Concilium,"
Vol. XXXV; New York: Paulist Press, 1968), p. 84. Herder-Dorneich is dean of
studies at the University of Cologne and director of a socio-economic research
institute there.
111 Ibid., pp. 86-87.
101 "

108

JAMES A. WISEMAN

lorum progres8io is in general quite positive (though he does
stress that it and similar documents represent only a beginning) ,112 Herder- Dorneich sees that, at least in terms of this
need for specialized knowledge, the encyclical was a regression
from Vatican II's relatively extensive use of experts to
broaden the base of underlying opinions. A small group of
theologians were responsible for the social theories of Populorum progres8io.113 This was accordingly "a step backward,"
for the pluralistic base was narrowed and " no real legitimate
basis for these socio-economic, non-theological ideas " was
offered. 114
As an example of consequent weaknesses in this encyclical,
Dr. Thomas S. Molnar of Brooklyn College points to its
"uncritical trust in 'public authorities' and 'government
officials ' " to lay down the objectives to be pursued and the
ends to be achieved in developing countries, for in fact the
major criticism against a program like the Alliance for Progress
" is precisely that its funds go to the government ... and are
distributed by and to its partisans, according to plans drawn
up by its own experts." ns When the encyclical singles out
" government officials " for planning, distributing, taxing, and
mobilizing the people and the economy, this "adds the seal of
approval to their already swollen power over present and
future, local and foreign funds." 116 Molnar traces such a weakness to the churches' lack of " an independent research apparatus"; 117 Herder-Dorneich echoes this with a call for the
creation of lay councils to assist such bodies as the various
episcopal conferences, councils made up " not [of] famous
writers and theologians but competent specialists in specific
112 Schillebeeckx, ·'Church,
Magisterium and Politics," God the Future of Man,
p. 159, and" Epilogue: The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's Future
on Earth," ibid., p. 203.
118 Herder-Dorneich,
p. 87. He adds: " We do not know if the opinions of
dissenting experts were given consideration. We do not know who chose the authors
and advisers, or how they were chosen."
1 " Ibid., p. 88.
115 Molnar, "Christian
Churches and World Affairs: A View of Recent Declarations on Aid," Worklview, X (Sept. 1967), p. 5.
116 Ibid.
117 Ibid., p. 7.

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

243

fields who know their job. Their task in these councils will be
to serve as spokesmen for a professional point of view " in an
atmosphere conducive to conflict and debate. 118 All this is
clearly in accord with Schillebeeckx's own insistence that the
hierarchy work with competent laymen in exercizing the function of critical negativity, but Molnar and Herder-Dorneich
seem to have a fuller grasp of just what this kind of dialogue
reqmres.

The Question of Overemphasis on the Negative
Finally, there is the criticism which Schillebeeckx himself
anticipated when he wrote that the fact that the distinctively
Christian contribution to the building up of a more fully human
society is critically negative " may perhaps make it appear
insignificant." 119 One could agree with him that this negative
function is important but still ask whether he does not overemphasize it. This is in fact a central question in a critique of
Schillebeeckx's position by William Hill, 0. P. 120 Hill grants
that "critical negativity" takes the problem of evil seriously,
but he goes on to write that the negativity of faith seems uppermost for Schillebeeckx, who claims that " the Christian has as
little positive idea as the non-Christian of what is worthy of
man, either ultimately or here and now." 121 Hill asks whether
" the illuminative power of faith does not call for something
more than ' critical negativity ' in the face of human ideologies"; accordingly he maintains towards Schillebeeckx's project the reservation "that it is not clear how it makes any
allowance for a positive contribution to the future that is
Christian in any specific and explicit way. What is lacking is
reference to the Christian vision, as something dogmatic and
doctrinal in kind." 122
Herder-Dorneich, p. 91.
Schillebeeckx, "Epilogue: The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's
Future on Earth," God the Future of Man, p. 194.
120 William J. Hill, 0. P., "Schillebeeckx's
New Look at Secularity: A Note,"
The Thomist, XXXIII (1969), pp. 162-70.
121 Schillebeeckx, "Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's
Future on Earth," God the Future of Man, p. 191, quoted by Hill, p. 168.
12 " Hill, p. 169.
118

119

244

JAMES A. WISEMAN

In assessing this critique it seems well to analyze carefully
the statement which Hill sees as epitomizing the negative
aspect of Schillebeeckx's position. For the latter to write that
the Christian has " as little positive idea as the non-Christian "
of what is ultimately worthy of man is at best an ambig-uous
assertion and seems actually to be inconsistent with his basic
notion of the Church as " sacrament of the world." If the
Church brings to self-consciousness what is implicit in the
concrete reality of human existence in the world, if in her there
becomes visible that which God intends for the whole world,
namely, "to bind men into a brotherhood on the basis of their
communion with God in his representative, Christ Jesus," 123
then it hardly seems sufficient to say that the Christian has no
more positive idea of what is ultimately worthy of man than
those for whom God's plan for the world has not reached this
level of consciousness. As Pastor Richard Neuhaus observes,
there are certain things in our history which are " preview
events" wherein Christians "have been able to see the end
time and the present time; most notably it is the life of Jesus
and his vindication in being raised from the dead. That is the
most significant proleptic or preview event that helps us . . .
to anticipate the kingdom of God." 124 Hill points to the same
event in specifying what he understands by Schillebeeckx's lack
of reference to the positive Christian vision: " In a real sense
Christ has already achieved his future, one, moreover, that we
know will be ours and that indeed is already in the process of
realization. Schillebeeckx, of course, denies none of this; at the
same time it is a dimension of faith that appears entirely inoperative in his new understanding of Christian secularity." 125
If Schillebeeckx's position needs some modification in this
regard, his assertion that the Christian has as little positive
idea as the non-Christian of what is here and now worthy of
123 Schillebeeckx, " Christelijk geloof en aardse toekomstverwachting,"
De zending
van de kerk, p. 63.
124 Richard Neuhaus, "In 1970:
What does it mean to be a Christian? " [edited
transcript of a conversation among the editors of the National Catholic Reporter,
Pastor Neuhaus, and Frs. James Groppi and John Dunne], National Catholic
Reporter, VI (Feb. 11, 1970), p. 5.
125 Hill, p. 169.

SCHILLEBEECKX

AND THE ECCLESIAL

FUNCTION

245

man seems much more securely grounded. While stressing that
Christians must commit themselves to positive, concrete plans
for the building up of the human community, he cautions that
the specific obligation contained in this positive element shares
in the absolutely obligatory character of the negative experience only "to a degree which the situation here and now will
determine." 126 To be sure, through more thorough analyses of
societal ills and more open dialogue among those making these
analyses it will become possible to determine ever more exactly
what, in the light of the Gospel, " ought to be done here and
now," but the certainty of having specified the best solution
will never be absolute. For one thing, as Herder-Dorneich
notes, "when we deal with the social order, we are always
dealing in the future, and the future is unknown." 127 Moreover, " social realities are not only unknown; they are also
undetermined. Individuals and social groups are historical
realities. They change over the course of time, and these
changes basically are not subject to human reckoning." 128
For these reasons, Schillebeeckx seems to be correct when,
while by no means denying the need for the Christian to commit himself to positive plans for a better world, he nevertheless
sees this positive element as only sharing, to a limited degree,
in the obligatory character of the " critical no " and in this
sense being subordinated to a " negative theology " in practical
matters. 129 Another passage from Pastor Neuhaus illustrates
very well the basis for this negative theology:
When one gets into the structuring of the social order, one must
be exceedingly modest. . . .
. . . What we have to recognize today is that the church is part
of the uncertainty of the human condition as is any other institution or any other community in the world, that the church is
radically a pilgrim community; in fact, it, of all the institutions in
128

Schillebeeckx, "Church, Magisterium and Politics," God the Future of Man,

p. 164.

Herder-Dorneich, p. 85.
Ibid.
129 Schillebeeckx, " Church, Magisterium
and Politics," God the Future of Man,
p. 164.
127

128

246

JAMES A. WISEMAN

the world, ought to be the one most acutely aware of its provisionality and its uncertainties. 130

Neither Neuhaus nor Schillebeeckx draw from their very
similar analyses any justification for inaction. In the former's
words, "we must have the courage of our uncertainties" and
be willing "to surrender ourselves, even to the point of death
itself, for the sake of these works [which we now envision]well knowing that we may be wrong." For "that, you see, is
what it means to trust God, because his rightness is greater
than our wrongness, his power to forgive is greater than our
power to hurt." 131
It is with a similar call to trust in God that Schillebeeckx
concludes his first explicit treatment of "critical negativity."
After noting that man, in his freedom, bears the burden of
constructing and extending the future for himself, he writes
that this is "a burden that is too heavy for him to bear alone.
This will create a new and hitherto unknow area wherein he
may find his security in the God who is to come, [a new area]
for trust in God." 132 In other words, " man, overburdened in
his freedom and left alone even by his fellow-men to make
free decisions, need not ultimately feel alone--as John observes
in a masterly statement in his gospel, given as a pure interpretation of Jesus' life (John 8: 16), 'I am not alone; the Father is
always with me.'" 133 Within the sphere of trust intrinsic to
this basic Christian spirituality of " evangelical consolation "
the Christian can, for Schillebeeckx, take on what seems impossible, ready to commit himself " radically to man and
society and to criticize, in faith, society as it is." 134 Thus does
he " integrate faith in the God who is to come and radical commitment to one's fellow-man with the function of 'critical
negativity.' " 135
JAMES A. WISEMAN, 0. S. B.
St. Anselm's Abbey
Washington, D. C.
130

Neuhaus, p. 5.

131

Ibid.

130 Schillebeeckx, "Epilogue:
The New Image of God, Secularization and Man's
Future on Earth," God the Future of Man, p. 200.
134 Ibid., p. 196.
135 Ibid., p. 199.
133 Ibid.

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF THE RELIGIOUS APRIORI

T

HE QUESTION I am treating asks whether and, if
so, to what degree religion is apriori to human living.
To my knowledge, Lonergan has not employed the
phrase "religious apriori" in writing, but he does speak of
"transcendental notion." In Insight Lonergan explains that
" a notion arises only in so far as understanding discerns future
function in present structure." (p. 354) In a lecture given since
Insight he discusses transcendental notion and means by this
the notions of being, truth, goodness and value. 1 Such notions
are apriori to the horizon of the human subject because in one's
knowing and living one spontaneously makes judgments and
decisions: a study of the structure of knowing reveals its
intrinsic orientation towards being (Insight, Chapter 12) ; the
structure of judgment, an intrinsic orientation towards objectivity (Chapter 13); the structure of choosing, an intrinsic
orientation towards goodness and value (Chapter 18, section
I). A denial that these notions are operative within the subject
is met by the argument by retort. Religion, consequently,
would be a transcendental notion only if it could be shown that
religion arises spontaneously in human knowing, or choosing, or
both. In this way the notion of religion (like the notions of
being, truth, objectivity, value) would be apriori to the horizon
of the subject.
These notions, although present within the field of consciousness, may not be expressly known to the subject: he demonstrates in his living that he considers some things worthwhile
and other things not worthwhile, yet he may never make
explicit the notion of value implicit in his decision making.
The transcendental notions, then, are within one's horizon, but
the subject without adequate self-knowledge will not know of
1

The Subject (Milwaukee:

Marquette University Press, 1968), pp.

247

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WILLIAM E. REISER

their presence. Thus in Insight Lonergan argues that metaphysics is rooted in structures " immanent and operative in all
human knowing" and that the process to explicit metaphysics
is "primarily a process to self-knowledge." (pp. 396-397)
We will proceed by attempting to show why the notion of
religion arises. We will do so by considering the role of religion
in human living, the problem of the meaning of human living,
and why the solution to this problem cannot be philosophical
but must be religious.
LovE AND SELF- TRANSCENDENCE

In a recent theology symposium 2 Lonergan began speaking
on " The Future of Christianity " by indicating seven areas
which the major world religions share in common, basing his
remarks on a work by Fredrich Heiler. 28 Lonergan went on to
develop the theme of self-transcendence, stating that it is by
transcending present limits of his growth that the human
subject achieves " authentic human living." The cognitional
aspect of the self-transcending process consists of learning, of
passing beyond or transcending present limits of experience, of
endless questioning which advances one to ever wider ranges
of understanding, and of judgments which transcend the individual subject through an intentional, objective claim of what
is or is not true for all subjects. In addition, there is an
operational level where the knowing subject is also a doer, and
self-transcendence on this level consists in doing what is good.
A major element in this doing is love, doing good for oneself,
family, and nation; and supreme among one's loves is love of
God. Lonergan contended that love is what principally effects
the self-transcendence of human growth; love of God above
all fulfills the subject most completely, grounding and trans• The symposium, entitled " The Future of Christianity," was held at the College
of the Holy Cross, December 14, 1968. Lonergan's paper was published, copyrighted
in his name, in The Holy Cross Quarterly, Winter, 1969.
"• " The History of Religion as Preparation for the Co-operation of Religions," in
The History of Religions, edited by M. Eliade and J. Kitagawa (Chicago: The
University of Chicago Press, 1959), pp.

LONERGAN's

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forming whatever else is loved in and because of God. Professor
Heiler's study had shown that the high religions taught the
goodness and love of God and that man must respond with
love of God above all things and all else loved in God. Lonergan was arguing, therefore, that a man succeeds in achieving
"authentic existence" to the extent that he transcends himself,
and the highest degree of such authenticity is reached when
one's potential for giving and receiving love is actuated by a
recognition of and response to God's gift of his love.
· In his paper, then, Lonergan was suggesting the apriori
character of love as the main technique in transcending oneself
and linked love of God with this self-transcendence. But when
one speaks in such terms he is implying that religion of some
kind will mediate man's arrival at " authentic existence" since
it is religion which talks to man about divine love. To express
this idea clearly we might say that Lonergan has attempted to
demonstrate that religion is a constitutive element of human
development insofar as that development is linked with love
and love of God actuates one's potential for giving and receiving love most fully. Such is the function of religion, a function
which each religion spells out differently in its own peculiar
conception of God, man, and the universe.
However, it is one thing to say that religion assists and
completes the project of achieving authentic existence and
another to claim that religion is, on that score alone, necessary
to human living. Does this do anything more than indicate
the role played by religion in human living? Might there be
other ways of working out one's self-transcendence? In short,
is religion apriori to man in that it alone critically and truthfully can be said to further man's development most effectively? Is openness to religion apriori to human nature? To
answer these questions we must return to Insight.
THE MEANING oF HuMAN LIVING

The issue centers on the problem of ultimate meaning. It
supposes that a mature, intelligent adult will ask himself about
the meaning of his life and the value or importance even of

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WILLIAM E. REISER

human history itself. For many, perhaps, ultimate meaning is
not an issue; but the explicit intent o£ Insight is to bring men
to raise questions, to campaign against every flight £rom understanding, to bring the knower to make the search £or truth the
effective center of his li£e.3 This intention will be fruitful once
the reader appropriates his own rational self-consciousness,
once he thoroughly understands what understanding is. Accomplishment o£ this involves, first, a transformation o£ the
subject wherein he commits himself to the search £or understanding and to critical positions (£or example, that one is a
rationally self-conscious subject; 4 that knowing means knowing
the real and that the real is what in £act is, that is, being; 5
that being is the objective o£ question-asking, the intrinsic
orientation o£ the drive to know; 6 that being is intelligible) .7
A second transformation occurs within the subject once he
realizes that he is not just a knower but also a doer, and that
while the real as intelligible is the objective o£ the subject's
desire to know, the real as good is the objective o£ his choosing.
This represents an advance upon the first transformation, £or
the intelligent subject finds himself committed to the truth
and, further, to action, to a living that should reflect intelligence
in its decisions and operations (c£. Chapter 18, section 1).
A third transformation occurs once the subject understands
that the existence o£ God is to be affirmed, because i£ the real
is intelligible, i£ £acts have explanations, then so also does the
£act o£ existence (c£. Chapter 19, sections 8 and 10). This is
3 Lonergan's
insistence upon raising relevant questions and giving the desire to
know free rein is stated at various places in the Preface and Introduction of
Insight. The flight from understanding is studied in Chapters 6 and 7 as
individual, group, and general bias. Chapter 10 treats correctness in knowing and
the necessity of asking all the pertinent questions on a given issue before one can
judge that he knows correctly. The aim of the book is, of course, thematic
throughout all twenty chapters.
•Insight, Chapter 11, sections 1-6.
passim. Judgment intends to affirm what is real and
• Ibid., Chapters 9 and
to deny what is not; the real is what is known when one knows correctly. Note
Chapter 10, sections 2-8.
• Ibid., Chapter 12, sections 1-4.
• Ibid., pp. 499-501.

LONERGAN's

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251

a consequence of the position that the real is intelligible and of
one's intelligent anticipation that the real is to be explained
fully. The explanation at least would have to require first,
necessary, and self-explanatory being; since nothing within
human experiencing is first, necessary, or self-explanatory being, then the explanation for the fact of existence-namely,
God, the ultimate principle of intelligibility-transcends
human experience; but the God question does not fall outside the
range of human questioning (c£. Chapter 19, sections 1, 2, 3).
An affirmation of God's existence, as worked out in Chapter 19
together with a notion of the God who is being affirmed,
involves a transformation of the subject on the level of his
knowing (for he judges that the existence of transcendent
being is a fact) and on the level of his living, his operations
(since he knows that he may not affirm the existence of an
intelligent God and then relegate him to a remote corner of the
universe) .8
Still, the issue of intelligent living pivots on the problem of
the intelligibility or meaning of human existence. Lonergan
raises the problem of evil in order to illuminate the larger
problem of meaning. 9 In Chapters 6 and 7 Lonergan talked
about the surd in the development both of the individual and
of history which arises from the selfishness, the short-range
views, the intellectual and moral blindness of which the human
subject is capable. From an historical perspective one might
conclude that sustained moral progress for man appears to be
impossible. The difficulty is not technological nor sociological;
8 Intelligent
living demands a consistency between what one knows and what
one does. Knowledge of God's existence and of the divine origins of the present
world order carries implications for living. See Chapter 19, p. 666, "In the twentyfourth place. . . ."
• Lonergan's statement on the problem occurs in Chapter
section 1; the issue
there is the surd in human progress caused by moral evil. One cannot read the
chapter and fail to see a wider context than the problem of evil: it is the
immanent intelligibility of human living which one seeks in asking why there is
human history at all. Does this mean that this intelligibility could be known by
natural religion? This is a question indirectly touching upon our topic. Lonergan
takes it up in "The Natural Desire to See God." See his CoUection (New York:
Herder and Herder, 1967), pp. 91-95.

WILLIAM E. REISER

the matter is man's personal and subjective inability to surmount his own condition. Each generation has to work out its
own self-transcendence; the experience of father cannot be
communicated to son; while fathers make convenants, their
sons can break them. Evil does not primarily exist within
social, political, or economic orders; it survives in the minds
and hearts of men. The passions and blindness and self-interest
which touched off war throughout the ages of mankind, which
occasion the violence and injustice in family and state, are not
now silent. This fact introduces the central questions on the
meaning of history and the meaning of the individual within
history.
Now the problem of meaning is intrinsically human in that
one is born into it; he need not look for it, he does not create
it; it is one's inheritance as he arrives in history. Yet, while
the fact of the problem also brings about man's need to transcend himself, this is only part of the issue. The solution to his
problem which opens the way of self-transcendence is quite
another matter. For if Lonergan has argued correctly, and I
believe he has, then one reasons that it is God who is responsible for the universe and this particular world order of which
we are a part; he is responsible for human history and for each
individual within that history. The ultimate meaning of human existence, then, cannot truthfully and critically be fundamentally a product of man's fabrication and intelligence, although men have offered many different solutions to the problem of meaning. The meaning of history must be grounded
within a meaningful universe, for a meaningful history within
a meaningless world order would be unintelligible. The sole
true meaning will be God's own, whatever he "meant" in
inaugurating this world order. It follows that, just as the
problem of meaning is of human concern, though not manmade, so too the solution that meets the problem will be a
solution for man, though not of his own making; man does not
know ultimately why he has appeared in time. Philosophers
can conjecture explanations, but only the first author of history
knows why there is history at all. That there is an author the

LONERGAN's

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253

philosopher can affirm; the specific intentions of that author,
however, the meaning he intended for man in creating mankind, are known only to him. Lonergan argues implicitly that
the solution to the problem of meaning will not be known by
man entirely unless God makes a statement to man. This much
is open to intelligence: by studying closely the nature of the
problem, one can erect a heuristic structure that specifies in
advance of the known solution the general lines which that
solution must assume.
Chapter
outlines explicitly the heuristic structure of the
solution. Furthermore, one may anticipate that if God is intelligent and good, if he grounds an intelligible universe, if he
is responsible for man with his desire to understand and his
problem of achieving authentic existence, then the solution will
be disclosed.
THE EMERGENCE

OF RELIGION

AS THE SOLUTION

In advance man knows heuristically that, given the prospect
of a disclosure from God, he will have to take God's word for
the validity of the solution for human living. Further, although
such a solution exists, man will not live to see its outcome in
history; his own life will end before history is finished. Consequently, one acknowledges ahead of time the presence of faith
or belief as partially constitutive of the implementation of the
solution in human living, and that the effectiveness of the solution depends on God, and a heart so believing is a heart aroused
by hope or trust. Hope also will be partially constitutive of the
implementation of the solution. Finally, since the problem of
meaning is accented by the presence of moral evil in human
living, the solution will not permit returning evil for evil
(thereby compounding the situation) but will demand meeting
evil head on with good. Such doing good is love or charity;
love will also be partially constitutive of the implementation of
the solution. Love, as pointed out earlier, is the chief means
for achieving the self-transcendence necessary for authentic
existence.
Now, the anticipated solution which is preliminarily defined

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WILLIAM E. REISER

in terms of faith, hope, and charity is not a philosophy but a
religion. As Lonergan puts it, "To live intelligently, reasonably, responsibly, an adult has to form some view of the
universe. . . . He may do so by appealing to myth, or to science,
or to philosophy, or to religion .... I have argued that man
exists authentically in the measure that he succeeds in selftranscendence, and I have found that self-transcendence has
both its fulfillment and its enduring ground in holiness, in God's
gift of his love to us." 10 Philosophy can indicate that God is
the ground to which one appeals for the ultimate intelligibility
of human existence; it can set the heuristic structure of that
anticipated intelligibility; but it must also await a disclosure
of the divine solution to be implemented in working out human
self-transcendence. It seems, then, that religion will be apriori
to human nature insofar as man seeks an answer to the question
about the meaning of life intelligently and critically, and discovers that the soluti<;>n lies in a transcendent source, and that
putting the solution into practice will entail self-transcendence
in terms of faith in God's design, hope in the effectiveness of his
design, and self-sacrificing love. Faith, hope and love are
characteristics of religion, not philosophy. Recognition of this
requires a transformation of the subject. 11
Lonergan outlined the solution in more detailed fashion in
Insight than I have done here, and he remained within the
context of the problem of evil. He shows, for instance, that the
solution will call for human collaboration with God's work in
history, that each one of us faces the task of identifying the
solution and acting upon it. I feel that the solution Lonergan
develops in Chapter 20 can be talked about in the context of
meaning. We must locate the real intelligibility of history and

° From his paper, " The Future of Christianity,"

loc. cit., p. 7.
In an article in Continuum, VI, 2, (1968) entitled "Horizon Analysis and
Eschatology," David Tracy places these transformations in tenns of " conversion "
and explains how conversion is a structural category in Lonergan's thinking on the
concept of horizon. This article is to date the best summary of the aim and scope
of Lonergan's work. Tracy situates Insight, which was completed around 1953,
within the broader framework of Lonergan's current reflections on meaning, horizon,
and theological method.
1

11

LONERGAN's

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255

of individual living, not in terms of what men do but in terms
of what they become in their doing, that if men fail in achieving
self-transcendence, then all else they do is worthless: on this
level there would be no difference between pyramids and computers. The goal of human living is development on all sides---:
intellectual, moral, psychological, religious-to attain authentic
existence; yet in working towards this goal one finds the recurrent failure in history and in his own living to hit the mark.
Man needs ever to raise himself beyond his human condition in
co-operation with God if self-transcendence is to become fully
realized.
Man's becoming, then, is the task of arriving at authentic
existence. From a higher viewpoint and within a Christian
context this task forms the basis for the notion of redemption.
The lifelong job of reaching authentic existence opens man and
history to a self-disclosure of God's own design and assistance.
Lonergan treats the redemptive aspect of human existence as
the basic intelligibility of human living, both individual and
historical, in terms of "the law of the Cross." 12 For our
present purposes it suffices to say that authentic human living
is essentially a matter of self-transcendence. Inasmuch as the
problem of meaning takes one beyond human living to its
transcendent ground, and inasmuch as the working out of one's
life project requires more than an intelligent answer to critical
questions, more than good will, then faith, hope, and charity
as elements of a religion will be permanent characteristics of
authentic, critical, reflective human living. The subject that
would meet the challenge of living head on will find himself
engaged in the task of self-transcendence which unfolds in the
several transformations sketched above. 13
De Verbo lncarnato (Rome: Gregorian Press, 1964), pp. 55!l-598.
The reader is again referred to Tracy's article, especially to page 175. I might
add that I have used the word " meaning " throughout this article in the general
sense of a pattern of living and not in the sense of Lonergan's own recent usage
of the term: the function and structure of meaning as a part of the subject's
cognitional operations. See, for instance, Chapter 16 of CoUection,"The Dimensions
of Meaning." Another sense of the word appears in Insight, Chapter 17, section S:
the problem of interpretation is concerned with uncovering meaning.
12

13

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WILLIAM E. REISER
CoNcLuDING

REMARKS

We must now meet the question of our opening sentence with
a clarification. Having looked at the way Lonergan conceives
the emergence of religion in human living and in human knowing, we should ask whether religion is in fact spontaneously
operative in our knowing or choosing, that is, whether it is a
transcendental notion like being and goodness. I would suggest
that religion arises in response to a search for meaning; with-·
out the searching, implicitly or explicitly undertaken, religious
structures will remain latent and inoperative in the consciousness of the subject. Still, some respond to this seeking with
other than religious solutions. We could hold that all authentic
seeking implies a theism insofar as the ·earnestly inquiring
subject is transcendentally open to all being, to an implied
acceptance of the conditions of being, and thus to God himself.
This would bring us, I believe, to the theistic atheism or transcendental theism of Rahner. (Or one could maintain that,
for example, Marx was setting up an ideology which in a
distorted way resembled religion: this, I find, is unsatisfactory.) Instead, perhaps wha.t we must first suppose is a
consciousness differentiated enough to be aware in some way
of the need for meaning, not escaping it by fleeing the demands
of rational consciousness. Second, we must suppose that the
quest for meaning will include the question about the existence
of anything at all, for this is the core issue in all inquiry into
meaning. The anticipated answer is what is meant by the
notion of God, a notion that arises in our knowing even before
we understand expressly what that notion is. 14 So then, a
I would add here that I have used the phrase " religious apriori" to indicate
the openness of human nature to a transcendent solution to the problem of meaning.
One might refer to Lonergan's essay "Openness and Religious Experience," which
is Chapter 12 of Collection; there the reader will find brief statements about
self-realization, horizon, and man's openness to the divine. In connection with that
chapter one should also refer to Chapter 5, "The Natural Desire to See God."
Further, the reader will find better treatment of the concept of horizon in the
article by Tracy spoken of above; see also Chapters 18 and 15 of CoUection. I
have been implicitly using the sense of horizon discussed there.
" Cf. Insight, p. 688.

LONERGAN's

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257

sufficiently differentiated consciousness is capable of recognizing the ground or structures of religion within his horizon, or
at least of implicitly accepting religion as it emerges somewhat
inadvertently in knowing and living.
However, it can also happen that a subject with a differentiated consciousness will reflectively study the structure of his
knowing. In this case he will either reach the various positions
which Lonergan takes in Insight, or because of the polymorphism of human consciousness will wander into any number of
counterpositions. 15 On the positions the knower will conclude
as we did above that religion is apriori to man; on the counterpositions he will be led to deny either the intelligibility of the
real, or the existence of God, or the possibility of a solution, or
that meaning is a problem to be settled initially outside history
in a metaphysics of the universe of being. But, by the same
token, on the positions one will conclude that correct knowing
is of the real and intrinsically objective; on the counterpositiom;
he will be led to deny that correct knowing is possible, or that
objectivity is possible, or that knowing is more than taking a
look.
In other words, I am suggesting that the notion of religion
is spontaneously operative in man's horizon, as are the notions
of truth or being or objectivity. But in the reflective moments
of knowing one can, if he is not critical, mistakenly hold that
such a notion is no more than an empty form without content,
or a vestige of mythical thinking in human consciousness, or
that it is not present in the first place but invented. The
difficulties come up on the reflective level; but the disorientation that can occur here cannot be corrected at once until the
requisite intellectual and moral transformations occur, that is,
not until one understands correctly the structure immanent in
knowing and choosing. What is important on the reflective
level, I submit, is the differentiation necessary to understand
and appropriate one's rational self-consciousness.
In the genetic moments of thinking the notion of religion
15

Ibid., pp. 887-890.

WILLIAM E. REISER

emerges after one attends to the fact of God's existence; this
is crucial to the consideration of religion. Still, the notion of
God is more or less pre-formulated in the questioning of the
human subject who inquires about the meaning of his own
existence, or the existence of history, or the existence of anything at all. The notion of religion, therefore, is apriori to
man's horizon but genetically dependent upon the notion of
God; and the notion of God is dependent on the notion of
being; and being is a transcendental notion.
WILLIAM
College of the Holy Cross

Worcester, Mass.

E. REISER, S.J.

HUMAN KNOWLEDGE OF GOD'S EXISTENCE IN
THE THEOLOGY OF BERNARD LONERGAN

I

GENERAL SITUATION OF his Approach. In contrast
to Barth and his followers who deny to man any knowl• edge of God apart from a direct and explicit divine
revelation/ Bernard Lonergan is one who stands in an older
Christian tradition which maintains that man cannot know
who God is by natural knowledge but that he can know something of what he is. With a faith in the reasonableness of
things, Lonergan asserts that our reason can tell us of God. 2
In his version of Marechalian Thomism, "the proof for God's
existence is somehow precontained in the orientation of the
human intellect toward being .... " 3 In this vision of man,
knowledge of God is not something that may or may not come
to man, but rather, by an eternal decree when he decided on the
creation of this particular world order, God made a certain
reflective knowledge of himself part and parcel of the human
intellect's desire to know and affirm absolute truth. 4 From
this point of view the question is not whether or not man could
ever know of God without explicit revelation but precisely
how man of his very nature knows of God.
II. The Transcendental Method. To understand Lonergan's
approach to natural theology one must first begin with Kant.
The Marechalian school depends on Kant primarily for the
1 E. g., Karl Barth, Dogmatics in Outline (New York:
Harper and Row, 1959),
p. 23.
2 For one of the clearest formulations, see Augustine's Letter 120 in Hazelton's
Selected Writings of St. Augustine (Cleveland: World Publishing Co., 1962),
p. 130-138.
3 J. B. Lotz in "Immanuel
Kant," in v. 8 of the New Catholic Encyclopedia
(New York, 1967), p. 127.
• Lonergan's "The Natural Desire to See God," in CoUection (New York:
Herder and Herder, 1967), p. 84-95.

2.59

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PATRICIA

WILSON

transcendental method. For Kant " ... transcendental means
practically the same as pure and a priori. By transcendental
discourses Kant understands those which transcend experience
and consider its a priori conditions." 5 The question is how
human knowledge is possible; in what way does man know.
For Kant, the answer can be found in going beyond the
contents of knowledge to the a priori forms that make our
knowledge possible, to the subjective conditions of experience.
Man knows through and because of the a priori forms and thus
is limited to and by them. For Kant, transcendental knowledge
is an illusion, and all that can be known is the content of sense
experience; things in themselves are unknowable. (Although
Kant affirmed the existence of God, the basis of his argument
was from the categorical imperative, not from rational knowledge.)
The transcendental method might at first seem to exclude
absolutely any natural knowledge of God. But in the twentieth
century Joseph Marechal confronted Thomism and Kantian
epistemology and emerged with a quite different result concerning man's knowledge of a transcendent being. Marechal found
that the transcendental method, if properly applied, revealed
an intellect which in its acts of knowing was striving to affirm
being and not just knowing. This finalistic striving is the basic
condition of the possibility of all human knowing. J. B. Lotz
describes the Marechalian concept of Kant's method:
The transcendental method can be carried through in a way that
goes beyond Kant himself to arrive at being as the primary condition for the possibility for human knowledge, and even of human
action. This basic idea has far-reaching consequences. The proof
for God's existence is somehow precontained in the orientation of
intellect toward being; thus does theoretical metaphysics become
possible. Being, too, enables a priori knowledge to reveal rather
than conceal, as it must do for Kant. Again, the formal objects
for the soul's faculties correspond to Kant's forms; thus knowledge
through categories is not restricted to that which is " for man,"
but opens up to that which is "in itself." Finally the absoluteness
• Dr. Paul Carus, essay in Kant's Prolegomena (La Salle, ID.: Open Court
Publishing Co., 1955), p. IS!t.

HUMAN

KNOWLEDGE

OF GOD's

EXISTENCE

of the moral imperative also receives its foundation in being, and
thus theory and practice are brought into harmony and unity. 5
The Marechalian school was also influenced by Hegel and
Fichte and the Heideggerian reinterpretation of Kant, but it
centers its primary philosophical concern on Kant's critical
philosophical analysis and the philosophy of Aquinas. 7 They
did not dispute the correctness of Thomas's explanation of
reality; the Marechalians tried to provide a critical method
and foundation for the reflective question of how this correct
view could be reached. They maintained that for Aquinas the
critical question of reflection could not yet be asked. As
Lonergan remarks in the preface to his Verbum studies, " From
performance must proceed reflection on performance, and
method is the fruit of that reflection. Aquinas had to be
content to perform." 8 Thus Aquinas gave no methodological
criteria; he had to perform the task of simply knowing being.
It was left to others to reflect on the method.
A key notion that distinguishes the Marechalian school
(following Thomism) from other philosophical groups is that
it is intellectualistic rather than conceptualistic. , Lonergan
describes what he conceives to be the basic difference:
The Platonist conceives knowing primarily as confrontation, but
the Aristotelian conceives knowing primarily as perfection, act,
identity; again, the conceptualist knows human intellect only by
what it does, but the intellectualist knows and analyses not only
what intelligence in act does but also what it is.9
For the conceptualist knowledge is a matter-of-fact looking
at things and seeing or not seeing; one knows or one does not
know, and if one does not see one might as well give up. One
has no critical faculties by which to explain how one knows and
the way in which the human mind discerns truth from falsity.
• In New Catholic Encyclopedia, already cited; see also Karl Rahner in Nature
and Grace (London: Sheed and Ward, 1968), p. 10.
7 For the general history see Otto Muck,
The Transcendental Method (New
York: Herder and Herder, 1968).
• Verbum xiii (South Bend, Ind.: Notre Dame Press, 1967).
"Verbum Studies, 186-187.

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PATRICIA

WILSON

Even in such a view of Thomism as that proposed by Etienne
Gilson there is a ". . . general osmosis between sense and
understanding," 10 but there is no explanation of critical judgment. But for the intellectualist, knowing is an act by which
one reflects upon phantasms, abstracts to a knowledge of
universals, and affirms in judgment. Since knowing is an action
performed by the intellect, one can know more or less, have
better or worse insights, and have a critical base for improving
one's knowledge of reality. Thus the transcendental method
stresses man's capacity to know being, demonstrating this by
an analysis of the human act of knowing. In its stress on the
human act of judging as the final step of the human act of
knowing, it asserts that in the very act of knowing man is
asserting being. He does not simply receive a concept by
osmosis in his mind; he rather consciously reflects upon the
information that his senses receive and asserts that the concept
in his mind corresponds to or does not correspond to reality.
The dynamism of man's intellect is not to know knowing
but to know being. Consequently, the a priori forms of knowing are not just inexplicably there, but these are the ways
that man knows because that is the way being is. To assert
otherwise is to make our knowing nonsensical, to assert that
it is not knowledge of the real, and thus ultimately is a meaningless effort. But to assert this is to assert something true
about reality (from the subject's point of view) which is a
statement that cannot be made from the point of view that
denies the intelligibility of reality. One must either assert
intelligibility or keep silence.
One must conclude that to know is to assert truth about
being. Being (as the most general and comprehensive term
for all that is) is the object of the intellect, since the intellect
seeks to know the real (all that is). Being and the real are
10 Lonergan, Collection, p. 211:
217-219. In his intentions Gilson may be neither
a Platonist nor a conceptualist; nonetheless his methodology involves him in a
dogmatic idealism which suffers from the same weakness in its method, since
Gilson cannot explain how the pertinent questions about being can be answered.

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synonymous. What, then, is there to know but being? 11 Furthermore, it must ultimately be concluded that the drive to
know being must be founded in the Absolute. Man's assertions
about being contain a conditioned absoluteness; he asserts that
he knows the truth about being, but this knowledge is always
subject to fallacies (even though there is a self-corrective
dynamism in the asking of further and further questions) and
it is above all always incomplete. Although man is always seeking absolute knowledge of being, he can never affirm that he
possesses it. The only possible explanation for such striving is
that there is an absolute being which is the ground and the
foundation of all this striving. (If there is no such being, then
there is really not an explanation, since the intellectual
dynamism of man is doomed to frustration, and reality IS
unintelligible.)
III. Lonergan's Background j1·om Other Sources. In order
to understand more fully Lonergan's concept of man's knowledge of God (which encompasses both natural knowledge of
God and its relation to possible supernatural knowledge) it is
necessary to examine the major influences upon him from outside the Marechalian school. In this survery primary attention
must be paid to Newman.
Lonergan admits his debt to Newman, spectifically to his
Grammar of Assent. 12 Lonergan's insistence on the importance
of judgment and on its absolute character is most probably
influenced by Newman's insistence on it; certainly there is a
11 It is significant
to note that apparently independently Michael Polanyi constructs, in
Knmvledge, a fiduciary philosophy in which he emphasizes the
futility of the search for absolute objectivity as a possibility for human knowing
and shows that one must accept one's dependence on one's own intelligence. He
demonstrates the dynamic nature of the human process of knowing and stresses
that the human mind can and does know reality. He maintains that the inner
dynamic of the intellect provides for critical analysis of the data for knowing,
(by the total process of knowing, and the constant re-evaluation and asking further
questions, we can assert with certitude that we are knowing truth). For purposes
of comparison with Lonergan and the Marechalian school it is important to note
that Polanyi's " post critical " philosophy also stresses knowledge as act and the real
capacity of the hnman intellect to critically know reality.
12 Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association (1967), p. !l57.

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striking resemblance between the structure of the relation of
natural theology to supernatural theology in Newman and in
Lonergan. For Newman, natural knowledge of God is based
on conscience and on a sense of God's holiness. 13 (In this view
he was heavily influenced by his early religious background in
evangelism, the spirituality of the Tractarian movement, and
quite possibly by a secondhand Kantianism.) Parallel to the
sense of God's holiness which all men feel is the sense of human
sinfulness present in all aspirations toward God. Man's sense
of sinfulness leads to a felt need for salvation, a salvation
which only God can give to man. " Natural religion " can at
most express this longing; only Christianity can satisfy this
desire in Christ, since in him God became man to reconcile man
to himself. The structure of this argument is important for
Lonergan; man can know something of God by the faculties
within him (the conscience); coupled with this knowledge is
the experience of sin which makes God unattainable to sinful
man: man can only be delivered from such a situation by God
himself, and only Christianity claims to offer such a solution.
Newman certainly derived this basic view from his own religious background; it is also possible that some of this formulation may have been influenced by the continental transcendentalism that was becoming well-known in England through
the influence of such literary figures as Coleridge. 14
Kant is here to be considered from a different point of view
than that of the originator of the transcendental method. In
the Critique of Pure Reason transcendental knowledge was
rejected as an illusion; however, by the experience of the categorical imperative man had the assurance of the existence of
an absolutely holy judge. In Religion within the Limits of Pure
Reason Alone Kant uses the fact of evil as a pivot for man's
religious life, although in a quite different way from Newman's.
He asserts that man must change his heart and so act as to be
worthy of God's assistance by a practical faith in Christ. Kant
Grammar of Aaaoot (New York: Doubleday, 1955), p. SOO ft.
Basil Wiley, Nineteenth Century Studies (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1949), esp. p. 90.
13

10

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265

rejects the idea of grace or of God's personal assistance, since
this would take away man's responsiblity. Kant argues that,
if we ought to do something, then we can. Man must do himself what God expects him to do. God's holiness (or rather,
Jesus' example of godliness) is the ideal that we must live
up to. Man must reverse the process of sin if God is to reward
him with eternal happiness. Ethics leads to religion and not
vice-versa. Evil and the struggle for moral fulfillment of duty
is what leads man to religion. There is no thought of grace or
of salvation, only of man's fulfillment of his duty. The experience of evil is a spur and a warning to man that he must do
his duty in the face of a righteous judge. Only such an ethical
man is worthy of God.
One of Kant's teachers, Knutzen, influenced by Wolffian
rationalism and Lutheran pietism, formulated the problem of
man's experience of evil in relation to God's holiness as follows:
1. Divine revelation is necessary to satisfy [for] man's guilt
[which he knows about but does not know how to expiate].
2. It must reveal God's holiness and provide for man's salvation.
3. Christianity is the only religion which does provide for this. 15

One immediately discerns the pietist concern with the holiness
of God, but there also appears a strong concern for a logical
formulation for the truth of Christian revelation from the
demands of the experience of evil. There is a striking similarity
to Newman's argument; and Newman was quite probably
acquainted with Knutzen's approach, at least secondhand.
However, there are serious differences: Knutzen appears to
have paid little attention to natural religion in the formal argument, whereas Newman incorporates it into the structure as a
major part of the argument for a universally experienced desire
for salvation.
It is certainly true that Christianity has, in its traditional
teaching, always presented evil and sin as facts of experience
which cry for God's salvation. However, Newman seems to
15 See J. Silber, essay in Religion within the Limits of Rea:ton Alone (New York:
Harper and Row, 1960), p. xxvi.

PATRICIA

WILSON

have been the first to formulate the relationship between
natural knowledge and revealed religions so explicitly. Certainly Kant and Newman were both influenced by pietist-evangelical religious views about the importance of evil in man's
relation to God. However, the differing attitudes toward the
importance to be accorded to human reason gave disparate
explanations of a common religious experience. It appears that
Lonergan (with appropriate differences in approach-from an
ethical to a more intellectual approach) seems to depend more
or less directly on Newman for the structure of his argument
on the relation of natural knowldge to revealed knowledge.
IV. Lonergan and the Possibility of Natural Theology. In
order to see more completely how Lonergan approaches the
problem of natural theology, we have presented relevant historical background in philosophy and theology. In the Verbum
studies Lonergan exposed from the historical viewpoint the
understanding of knowledge which he develops systematically
in Insight. The structure of Insight may be sumarily given as
the following: first Lonergan analyzes the process by which
man knows and then explores the structure of what he knows.
After this he considers the problem of what man can know of
God, the fact of evil, and the possible solution to the difficulty
raised by evil.
On page xxviii of the preface, Lonergan summarizes the
major theme of Insight:
Thoroughly understand what it is to understand, and not only
will you understand the broad lines of all that there is to be understood, but you will possess a fixed base, an invarient pattern,
opening upon all further developments of understanding.
The underlying reason why this can be said is that to know
is to know being, and if we know our knowing, we will know
what being is. The human intellect is striving to know beyond
its knowing, to know being, to assert the truth of reality. Once
this basic fact is accepted (and it must be if any knowledge is
to have sense or if any statement is to have meaning) one can
proceed with the analysis. Lonergan continues by demon-

HUMAN

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267

strating an isomorphic structural relationship between knowing
(sense perception, understanding, and judgment) and being
(matter, form, and act). This does not mean that elements
correspond but that the structure of knowing and the structure
of being correspond. In this point one can depend on the old
Aristotelian adage that one can know a being by its acts
(because a being acts according to its nature). Lonergan
systematically develops this principle through an introspective
analysis of the act of knowing which brings him to an understanding of what is known-being.
Perhaps more thoroughly than any other member of the
Marechalian school, Lonergan places great emphasis on the
importance of the act of judgment. A complete act of knowing
involves three steps: sense perception, abstraction to the level
of questions for intelligence" (the whatness of a thing), and
the reflective level of judgment, which is an assertion of truth
or falsity about the questions for intelligence. Judgment is an
absolute yes or no (unless one suspends judgment, which in
itself is a claim to valid judgment about the data available for
judgment). He distinguishes between the virtually unconditioned judgment, in which the conditions for judgment seem
to be fulfilled in the subject's understanding, and the formally
unconditioned judgment in which there simply are no conditions. The important point is that both claim to assert truth
and thus claim a corresponding absolute value. In the absolute
claim to truth is found the transition to being, since the subject
is claiming to make an assertion about being, reality.
Lonergan is not so naive as to believe that every human
subject always and invariably finds a true answer to his
questioning about reality. Here he methodically differs from
Fr. Coreth, who, he suggests, does not sufficiently acknowledge
the real problem of human error, counterpositions, and superstitions.16 Lonergan rather views the human process of judging
as a self-corrective process, if it is taken in its totality. If our
knowledge itself is a progressive process in which man advances
16

Collection, " Metaphysics as Horizon," p. 219.

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from narrower to broader points of view which more and more
are integrated into the intellectual grasp of the knowing subject, so judgment itself is subject to the same requirements of
asking further and further questions and forming our judgments in the light of these questions. He describes this process
in relation to judgments about concrete situations:
So it is the process of learning that breaks the vicious circle. Judgements on the correctness of insights supposes the prior acquisition
of a large number of correct insights. But the prior insights are
not correct just because we suppose them to be correct. They occur
within a self-correcting process in which the short-comings of each
insight provoke further questions to yield complementary insights.
Moreover this self-correcting process tends to a limit. We become
familiar with concrete situation; we know just what to expect;
when the unexpected occurs, we can spot just what has happened,
and why and what can be done to prevent just such a reoccurence;
or, if the unexpected is quite novel, we know enough to recommence
the process of learning and we can recognize when, once more, that
self-correction process reaches its limit in familiarity with the
concrete situation and in easy mastery of itY
The two characteristic features of judgment here clearly
emerge: its claim to absoluteness and its constantly expanding
quality. Of its very nature the process of judgment constantly
seeks to assert more and more about being, to know reality
more and more fully. These two characteristics are emphasized
by Lonergan, because in this dynamism of the intellect toward
absolute judgments about being he finds the key that demonstrates man's natural desire to know absolute being. In this
analysis Lonergan depends on Newman's analysis of the absolute nature of assent and on his understanding of the illative
sense: the mind's ability to know truth, not in a knowing
subject to logical form as in inference but in the critical
capacity to judge with certitude even though the judgment
cannot be proven on strictly logical grounds.
After sketching out the main outlines of an epistemology and
a metaphysics, in Chapter XIX Lonergan makes the transition
17

Insight (New York: Philosophical Library, 1958), p. !!86-!l87.

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from a knowledge of proportionate being (metaphysics, being
accessible to human experience) to a knowledge of transcendent being (natural theology, being not accessible to human
experience). He has distinguished two components in the idea
of being: 1) all that is known; 2) all that remains to be
known. 18 Thus there is a notion of being that is heuristic, indicating all that there is to know, not as known but as knowable;
there is also the idea of being, the content of " an unrestricted
act of understanding," 19 not accessible to a finite knower.
Being's unrestricted quality leads to the necessity of positing
a transcendental knower who can make an unrestricted act of
understanding. The infinite horizon of unlimited intelligent
questions, the element of transcendence and openness in a pure
and unresticted desire to know has already been established.
It is clear that man seeks to understand more and more about
being and can never have all his questions answered (e. g., he
can always ask himself why there is anything at all) . But, for
Lonergan, if being can be known, then it must somehow be
known by someone if the term intelligibility is to be meaningful. Knowledge can be held as possible if in fact it occurs. Yet,
despite his aspirations, man cannot now everything. He does
not know the aggregate of all facts; no finite being could know
or knows the comprehensive pattern that includes all things,
for to know this comprehensive pattern would be to stand
beyond the realm of finite things in a knowledge of them in
their totality. All finite knowing is inadequate to the total
task of knowing, individually or collectively.
Lonergan's simplest formula of the argument for the existence of God is as follows:
1) God exists if the real is completely intelligible.
2) But the real is completely intelligible.
3) Therefore, God exists.
Ibid., p. 880.
•• Ibid., p. 644.

18

•• Ibid.,
see also Schouburg, "A Note on Lonergan's Proof for the Existence
of God," Modern Schoolman (Mar., 1968), p. !MS-248.

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In order to establish this argument, Burrell points out, Lonergan must demonstrate:
1) Being is identical with the real.
2) Being is to be identified with complete intelligibility.
S) Complete intelligibility is to be identified with an unrestricted

act of understanding. 21
In exploring these notions of being and intelligibility Lonergan
maintains that the key issue is whether or not there is a being
which is the unconditioned act of understanding which in knowing itself knows all beings. 22 Lonergan's conclusion would be
that, since being is intelligible, there must be an unconditioned
and absolute being. This notion necessitates a more detailed
examination of being and intelligibility.
All knowing is a striving to know being. Knowing is not a
sterile act; to seek to know reality is to seek to possess the
form of thing in one's self. But if being is the object of our
knowing, it must be intelligible. To say that the object of our
knowing is not intelligible or is unknowable is to say that one
can assert nothing meaningful about reality, which statement
itself claims to be a meaningful assertion about reality. Thus,
either man's basic desire to know is valid or all attempt to
assert anything is an absurdity. All attempt to express and
communicate and to try to know the truth would have to cease;
this latter stand, if asserted, is self-contradictory. But, if one
asserts the intelligibility of being, one must assert its complete
intelligibility. Something which is not really known by at least
someone in fact is not really intelligible. (The identity of
being, the real, and the intelligible has already been demonstrated.) But, if there is only finite knowing, then something
always remains unknown, since the infinite horizon of possible
questions can never be comprehended by a finite knower, and
thus there must be an infinite and unrestricted knower who in
fact knows and comprehends all proportinate being.
21 Proceedings, " How Complete Can Intelligibility
Be:
Insight, Chapter XIX, p.
•• Insight, p. 646-657.

a Commentary on

HUMAN

KNOWLEDGl!J OF GOD1S EXISTENCE

At this point Lonergan relates his argument to the argument
from causality (of St. Thomas) .23 For him causality is " ...
the objective and real counterpart of the questions and further
questions raised by the detached and disinterested desire to
know." 24 If being is, then there must be an explanation for it;
that is, it must in fact be intelligible. An infinite knowledge is
a prerequisite for causality, since there must be a reason why a
thing has come to be. There can be nothing without explanation. But no finite conditioned being can explain (in the
complete sense) itself or other beings, since it depends on other
proportionate, finite beings. Since this is so, one must conclude
to the existence of a transcendent being with two basic attributes: " it must not be contingent in any respect. ... " and it
" ... must be capable of grounding the explanation about everything else. . . ." 25 This transcendent being is the cause of
causes and the ground of value.
After demonstrating the necessity of God's existence, Lonergan asserts that the notion and the affirmation of God are
one, if the terms are properly understood:
For the real is being, and apart from being there is nothing. Being
is not known without reasonable affirmation, and existence is the
respect in which being is known precisely inasmuch as it is affirmed
reasonably. Hence it is one and the same thing to say that God is
real, and that he is the object of reasonable affirmation, and that
he exists. 26

David Burrell has objected to the conclusion in Lonergan's
syllogism and asks how, if this being is complete intelligibility,
man (who can never grasp the meaning of complete intelligibility) can meaningfully assert God's existence. Man can, he
submits,
... find eminently plausible a belief in the reality of God as
ground of being and the source of inquiring intelligence. . . . For
23 From
On Being and Essence, quoted in Vernon Bourke, ed., The Pocket
Aquinas (New York: Washington Square Press, 1960), p. 159.
•• Insight, p. 651.
•• Ibid., p. 655.
•• Ibid., p. 699.

PATRICIA

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what we would be believing would be beyond our capacity to
affirm, but in the line of conscious desire, which operates in every
genuine affirmation. . . . But since plausibility has neither the
force of demonstration nor of an imperative, the affirmation of
God's reality requires an intervening decision that is at once
personal and free.27
Lonergan replied by pointing out that in human knowing
there is such a condition as intending. (Between knowing and
not knowing there is the process of coming to know.) We have
no immediate knowledge of complete intelligibility, but the
inner dynamic of the human intellect demands the infinite
horizon.
Our knowing intends not incomplete but complete intelligibility ....
Since intending is just another name for meaning, it follows that
complete intelligibility, so far from being meaningless to us, is in
fact, at the root of all our attempts to mean anything at all. 28
Lonergan's treatment of the notion of God is much the same
in its elements as the traditional Thomistic treatment. God
is primary truth, spirit, good, perfect, unconditioned, self-explanatory, one, simple, timeless, eternal, omnipotent efficient
cause, omnipotent exemplary cause, free, non-developing, creator, conservor, first agent, applying every agent to its operation,
ultimate final cause, ground of value, objective of all finalistic
strivings, personal. All attributes are derived from the notion
of God as the unconditioned, absolute knower.
The next development of the concept of natural knowledge
of God occurs in the confrontation with the problem of evil.
Before he had spoken of general transcendent knowledge of
God Lonergan had spoken of man's tehical responsibility, that
is, his free and personal acting in accordance with his knowledge of reality. Man has an obligation to act in accord with
the good, the order of reality, of being. He is in a process
of becoming free and needs to find a solution to the problem
of a higher integration of his concrete living with what ought
27
28

Proceedings, p. 253.
Ibid., p. 259.

HUMAN

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to be. Then briefly, in discussing human knowledge of God,
Lonergan refers to the fact of evil only to show that God is not
the cause of it. But immediately after he has demonstrated the
validity of general transcendent knowledge and the existence of
God, he raises the problem of evil in its full scope. It can be
clearly seen by anyone that sin and evil are present and
experienced, yet they are unintelligible and cannot be explained.
But sin is a perversion of both knowing and doing and necessarily leads to a less and less comprehensive knowing and doing.
Since man's knowledge and practice of good become more and
more limited, it becomes more and more difficult for man to
perform the effort of doing and knowing good. Thus he seems
to be in an inextricable trap. How can man reconcile this
experience of human existence with what he knows of God and
his existence?
Since, for Lonergan, God is seen as creating each world order
and knowing how it will unfold, 29 his activity in the world order
will be in accord with the nature of the world he has created.
Thus, since this world order is intrinsically intelligible, if we
can understand, even though in a very limited way, the nature
of the world and also, in a very real but finite way, the nature
of God and his attributes, then we can conclude something
about what God " ought" to do (but this is the " ought" of
fittingness not that of absolute necessity). If we consider both
the nature of the world order and of the God who created it,
the solution " ought " to be that this good God would give man
a supernatural means of charity in such a way that man can
freely accept it and cooperate with God. This solution, involving faith, hope, and love, would come in history by God's free
choice of possibilities, and would involve man in his own selftranscendence. (" ... On the present supposition of a supernatural solution, to be just a man is just what man cannot
be." 30 ) The solution would be a mystery, one, universally
acceptable, and permanent. It is only here that Lonergan's
29
80

Collection, "Natural Desire to See God," p. 94.
Insight, p.

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conception of reason's capacity to know stops, at the point
where reason hopes for a solution for the inextricable difficulty
man has gotten himself into. In the epilogue Lonergan points
out that the intellectus quaerens fidem can find the answer only
in Christianity, 31 but he has not yet published the promised
work on theology which would continue the path pointed out in
Insight.
It is to be noted that, while Lonergan appears to depend
heavily on Newman for the structure of his argument, he has
developed and changed the presentation in Newman's Grammar of Assent into a much more intellectualistic structure and
approach. Newman is concerned with reconciling man's desire
for holiness with God's absolute justice and holiness, while
Lonergan's concern is with reconciling man's desire for absolute
knowledge with the absolute reasonableness of God. By using
the problem of evil as a departure point, Lonergan shows how
man has enmeshed himself in a situation in which he is more
and more handicapped in his knowledge of reality and action in
accord with this reality. Confronted with this problem, man
can at least see, in a reasonable way, the general structure
which the solution ought to take. While the solution cannot be
clearly specified, the notes given are such that only Christianity
could fill them.
V. Conclusion-S. It is extremely difficult to offer summary
observations about a work which requires such intense and
involved study, for the argument for the existence of God and
the concept of the relation of natural theology to revealed
theology depends on all the analysis previous to it in Insight.
Ultimately the argument depends on the acceptance or rejection of Lonergan's complete analysis of man's cognitional
faculties.
One can note, however, that Lonergan provides a natural
theology which can be the basis of communication with nonbelievers (since general transcendental knowledge is accessible
to all who accept the intelligibility of the real) . This analysis
31

Ibid., p. 731.

HUMAN

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EXISTENCE

also provides theology with a methodical tool which will provide partial assessment for its procedures and conclusions. The
arguments Lonergan presents for the existence of God and the
reasonableness of revelation are, by the reason of the method,
accessible to those who interpret the principle of verification in
a broad sense 32 and are quite easily comprehensible to those
who are of a speculative or idealistic philosophical tendency. 33
On the other hand, to some, Lonergan places too much faith
in human reason, in man's capacity to know the truth. While
this argument is advanced against the whole system, the insistence becomes much greater when the question of the existence
of God and the relation of this knowledge to revelation is concerned. Some would argue that, in Burrell's words, Lonergan
has constructed an intellectual system of eminent plausibility
but that the system and its affirmations have neither the force
"of demonstration nor of an imperative." 34 While Lonergan's
vision is most useful in providing a coherent worldview for
those who accept the identity of being, reality, and intelligibility, the acceptance of this view demands a faith in reason
which is a basic assumption subject of its nature neither to
proof or demonstration. It requires, one might assert, an act
of belief which is a personal choice, and thus the acceptance of
this view is an existential choice rather than a simple acceptance of a rational demonstration already within the rational
framework; it is in fact the acceptance of that rational framework.
pATRICIA

WILSON

University of Iowa
Iowa City, Iowa

••" From a Historian of Philosophy," in Spirit as Inquiry, quoted in Proceedings
by Andrew Reck, p.
88 Reck, loc. cit., p. 240.
•• As Burrell suggests of his argument for the existence of God.

LOGICAL NOTE ON THE COEXISTENCE
FAITH AND REASON

OF

C

HURCH CONTROL OF human reflection has been the
focus of fierce criticism on the part of the theologians.
We are not saying that all theologians are engaged in
this controversy, but there is a widespread uneasiness among
them. Some are extremists who seem to claim an unconditional
freedom of thought and expression which they entitle " academic freedom." Today, as in times past, "La libre pensee"
has always been a temptation among the clerics of the Frenchspeaking countries; and the "Free Thinkers" have also been
influential in the Anglo-Saxon milieu. This state of affairs is
not only proper to the domain of theologians but is also found
among philosophers. Moreover, it is not only limited to Christianity but is also verified in the Jewish as well as in the Arabic
intelligentsia from the time of the historical encounter of their
religious wisdom with Hellenistic culture. 1 This historical situation seems to suggest that there is a common Eidos which
characterizes the conditions of intellectual research wherever
this uneasiness appears. What is this?
For all these thinkers it is nothing but the experience of the
price of the meeting of God with man, the coexistence of an
authoritative teaching with a self-sufficient inquiry, and the
cohabitation of Faith and Reason in one and the same consciousness. In short, it is the challenge of reason by Reason,
or inversely.
We propose to analyze the specific case of a person who is
both a believer and a philosopher. We say first, a believer,
because the philosopher will not face this crisis unless he be1 Cf. Etienne Gilson, History of Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages (New
York, 1955), p. 184, for the Arabs, and the case of Spinoza in the 17th century for
the Jewish thinkers.

276

THE COEXISTENCE

OF FAITH AND REASON

'27"7

lieves. It would not be very common for a philosopher to
become a believer at the very moment in which he finds Faith
to be problematic. We deliberately limit our analysis to the
case of the Christian metaphysician. In a first section we shall
briefly formulate the assumptions, explicit or implicit, which
constitute his spiritual horizon, while detecting the vectorial
components which determine his initial position. In a second
section, we shall examine, from a strictly logical viewpoint, the
four possible attitudes which can be taken by him. In a third
and last section, we shall deal with the problem of Christian
Philosophy as a corollary of the fourth attitude.

*

*

*

*

Christianity claims to be a way of life proposed to us as
intelligent and responsible persons for reaching salvation
through a dialogue between God and mankind. Historically,
this dialogue took place somewhere, at some time, and with
someone. The aspect of " way of life " has been so much
emphasized by a group of believers that any intellectual
content seems to have been excluded or at least purposely
overlooked. But this view is neither in accordance with historical data nor in agreement with human psychology. The
Scriptures are clear on this subject, and Tradition has elaborated Creeds. This way of life does not result from a pure
training which would produce conditioned reflexes. The reason
for this conclusion is that any way of life which would entail
some discomfort or trouble, both social and personal, cannot
be accepted unless it makes sense. Consequently, conversion of
heart cannot be understood without a free decision of the mind.
But this free decision requires a minimum of noematic intelligibility for enlightening interior judgment, one of its necessary
conditions. As a matter of fact, it is through God's theophanies,
through the teaching of Moses and the Prophets, and through
Christ's deeds and words that a doctrine which expresses God's
project for mankind was made known to men. Through images,
parables, and myths, a set of truths on the meaning of life was
conveyed to the minds of the listeners regarding the objective

ELEUTHERE

WINANCE

factors of its realization and of the subjective attitudes of its
acceptance. Now we cannot help assenting to a group of statements which constitute Christian Doctrine; in other words, the
way of life is characterized by a doctrinal content. This content
can be summarily presented as a conjunction of the following
points: Monotheism, Transcendency, Blessed Trinity, Incarnate Word, Universal Salvation, Propitiatory Sacrifice, Sacramental Order, Bodily Resurrection, Ethical Ideal, Human
Responsibility, Adoptive Sonship, and Ultimate Coming of the
Lord with Eternal Happiness. 2
This set of statements which are objectively proposed to
us by the means of a divine Revelation is subjectively received
by man through a specific complex activity of human consciousness, namely, an act of Faith. Supernatural in its origin,
reasonable as a noetic attitude, perfectly free in its execution,
this act is first of all, but not exclusively, an assent to a
noematic term which, as a divine message, is merely taught as
the Good News of the Kingdom of God without any concern
for a demonstration. As such, this term remains inevident,
and no effort is attempted for unveiling any evidence. No selfevidence, no articulate proof will reveal the truth-value of
these meaningful propositions as long as they are communicated through the ecclesial Kerygma: the noema of an act of
believing is not a self-shining truth, while its noesis must be
founded upon good reasons. 3 In other words, human reflection
has to investigate the credentials on which the authority of a
witness ultimately relies because the noesis of Faith claims to
be reasonable or in accordance with reason, although its noema,
which can be a mystery, escapes any logical positive analysis. 4
• We symbolise sacred doctrine (S D) as the conjunction or the logical product
of propositions as follows: (S.D.) =M&T&B&I&S&P&S&R&R&E&H
& A & U & H) . By so doing, it will be easier to apply logical laws.
8 I Peter 8: 15: " Simply reverence the Lord Christ in your hearts, and always
have your answer ready for people who ask you the reason for the hope that you
all have."
• No mystery belongs either to a set of axioms conceived by human reason or to
the set of theorems derived from them by a strict logical process. In other words,
there is no evidence in the sense of ground for affirming something as trne in the

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279

What matters for a believer in this situation is to be aware of
the fact that the noematic term of Faith as such is not related,
even if eventually it could be so, to any factual or eidetic evidence whatsoever.
The reason for this lack of evidence in several statements
which belong to the Creed, such as the affirmation of the Blessed
Trinity, the Incarnation of the Word, or, more explicitly, the
reason why no human intellect is able to perceive any satisfying
explanation of their truth has to be found in the very nature
of the signifying function of their concepts when they are used
in revealed propositions. For, although these propositions are
expressed in human concepts, they aim at a Reality which
transcends human grasping. Consequently, their notions are
loaded with a "hyper-meaning." Holy Scripture, indeed, does
not reveal to us new ideas, since it seems likely that our
existential experience is the sole cradle for all significations
for man. But, through a simple language, the Sacred Word
aims at a new order of reality and intelligibility. As a general
rule, the words in use are not even borrowed from a technical
vocabulary which could reflect a very elaborated thought but
from a level of understanding accessible to any mind. Even
in the case of the term Logos found in St. John's Gospel, in
spite of its philosophical connotation, this name has to be
replaced in the context of the Jewish tradition of the theory of
Wisdom and, moreover, has to be taken as employed in a very
loose relation with a metaphysical system. But, if it is true
that some propositions of the Creed cannot be demonstrated
by reducing them to some philosophical principles, it is also
true that, for some statements belonging to the set of Christian
beliefs, this reduction is not only possible but is also desirable
and has historically come about. In this case the believers are
in a position to verify by themselves what these statements
convey to them by way of authority. It is a genuine case of
" fides quaerens intellectum " in a proper sense. The countercase of a mystery such as the Blessed Trinity: neither immediate evidence in the
classical sense of an axiom understood as a self-evident proposition on account of its
terms nor mediate evidence understood as the evidence of a conclusion on account
of a demonstration.

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WINANCE

part of this reduction to rational principles is that these statements are no longer an object of faith insofar as they are the
conclusion of a demonstration. 5 Consequently, we are now
obliged to introduce among the truths contained in the treasury
of Faith, the " Depositum Fidei," a distinction of a great
importance. On the one hand, we are taught a set of propositions which are "super-intelligible"
as far as they signify
the "mysteries hidden to any human intellect"; on the other
hand, we are given several answers to philosophical problems
through an authoritative method which, of course, leaves the
whole problematic open from the viewpoint of the rational
exigencies. They remain, indeed, actually or potentially solved
by philosophers in the framework of their axioms, categories,
and logical processes. Thus the class of revealed truths intersects the class of philosophical truths. Now we face this logical
situation which can be described as follows. In the universal
class of all the truths which can be found in a human consciousness, besides physical, mathematical, psychological, moral and
other types of truths, we can determine two intersecting classes
which are subdistinguished into three sub-classes: 1) the subclass of revealed but non-demonstrable truths, the sub-class
of the revealed-per se as far as essentially and exclusively
knowable through a Revelation of God; 2) the sub-class of
revealed but also demonstrable truths, the sub-class of the
revealed-per accidens as far as essentially knowable through
reason but as de facto historically revealed; 3) the sub-class of
non-revealed at all but rationally demonstrable truths, the class
of philosophical opinions about which, so far, Revelation has
neither direct nor indirect concern. 6 It is the meeting of Faith
5

6

This doctrine is affirmed by Thomas Aquinas in Summa Theol., II-II, q. 1, a. 4.
We might diagram this logical situation:

Philosophicaltruths
Revealed pel' se

Scientific, common sense truths
(not revealed and not philosophical)
Revealed per accidens

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281

and Reason on this ground of intersection which creates one
of the most touchy spots in the field of scientific knowledge.
It is there that the problem of coexistence arises in a definite
and unambiguous way in a critical, living consciousness; it is
there that a conflicting situation may oppose one to another,
the philosopher and the believer.

*

*

*

*

It may happen that the propositions of Reason contradict
the dogmas of Faith. For example, we may imagine this state
of affairs which, as a matter of fact, has been truly verified
in the course of history when some philosophical systems,
doctrines, or outlooks did not square with the religious beliefs,
exigencies, or ideals of the day. 7 For it is not absurd to conceive of the following oppositions: the affirmation of a necessary emanation and a blind determinism on the part of the
philosopher and the profession of a free creation and a loving
providence on the part of a believer; the affirmation of conditioned behavior or a situational ethics on the part of a
contemporary and the conviction of a responsible freedom and
a moral order on the part of a believer. Both philosophical
statements and religious beliefs are contradictorily opposed:
no free creation and free creation, no personal decision and
personal decision, no objective standard and objective standard.
These contradictions are in the mind of a religious philosopher.
A historical difficulty can always be avoided by a prudent
skepticism: who knows truth in this factual issue made up
of so many details? But a logical contradiction is a stumbling
block which brings thought to a dead end. One and the same
thinker, being both a philosopher and a believer, experiences
the most agonizing intellectual predicament: he contradicts
himself.
The conjunction oi " Religious Doctrine " and " Philosophical System " implies a " contradictory consequent " on account
7 For example, the crisis which arose in the 13th century at Paris when Averroistic
doctrines were taught in opposition to Christian beliefs, such as the eternity of the
world, the unity of the intellect.

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of at least one contradiction or several ones. This very simple
conditional statement, " I£ I think reflectively and I believe
religiously, then I contradict myself," contains a consequent
which is acknowledged to be false by every philosopher, or at
least logically unacceptable. This consensus derives from the
pragmatic agreement on a minimum which conditions a constructive dialogue or a meaningful intersubjectivity, namely,
the absence of contradiction. Let us postulate for the sake of
simplicity that we consider a contradiction to be false and a
system of logic to be the two-value false-or-true system of
logic. With this assumption, this conditional proposition is no
longer true unless the antecedent itself is denied as false. Consequently, it is false to accept both the religious doctrine and
the philosophical system. In other words, it is false to affirm
them together. Therefore, it is no longer a genuine human
attitude to be both a believer and a philosopher.
The first step in the logical reflection of the believing philosopher has been to deny the truth of an antecedent because of
the falsehood of the consequent by applying the mode tollendotollens. The second step will be to translate the denied conjunction into a disjunction of denials by applying the Morgan'.'J
law according to which the negation of a conjunction amounts
to the disjunction of the denied primitive propositions. 8 In
our specific case this means that either we consider the religious
doctrine as false or we regard the philosophical system as false.
But as soon as we face an alternative concerning the truthvalue of its members, we are in a situation either to reject the
alternative as futile and unrelated to life or to accept it as
8

Schematic argument:
1) (Faith and
(contradiction)
But, any contradiction is false
Then, we must deny the conjunction of Faith and Reason; in symbols we
shall write (F & R) ·
· (P & -P)
- (P &-P)
- (F&R)
Application of Morgan's Law
- (F & R) · = · -F V -R In other words, the denial of a Conjunction
(Logical Product) is the disjunction (Logical Sum) of the denials. Then,
-Faith V -Reason. Either Faith is false or Reason is false.

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283

vital and inevitable. This last is the case of anyone who has
been already committed both to religious faith and philosophical reflection. He cannot help being in a state of doubt or
questioning, the Aristotelian aporia (cl7rop£a). Thus the religious
thinker is now seriously challenged about his position, namely,
the authenticity of his attitude. Is it truly fair to be both a
believer and a philosopher? Prima facie, the situation seems to
be intricate and hopeless: one will be the loser, the believer or
the philosopher. Perhaps after serious reflection a gentleman's
agreement can be reached to the satisfaction of both.
Since there is an incompatibility between religious dogmas
and philosophical conclusions, then it follows both from the
Thomistic principle of the specification of acts by objects and
from the phenomenological law of the correlation between the
noemas and the noeses that Faith and Reason are no longer
compatible activities. Since they are no longer compatible, it
follows that a choice is inevitable. Is it an exclusive choice?
That is the question. Because of this need to choose we already
face two basic attitudes:
the philosophical system can be
chosen as the ultimate criterion of truth or the religious creed
can be preferred as the final standard of evaluation. But in
both cases a more subtle analysis may suggest to us either an
absolute application of the principle of choice or a relative use
of this principle in our difficult problem. Either we take a
position without any spirit of tolerance or we welcome a pacific
coexistence. I must confess that our tolerance is not inspired
by courtesy but by logic. Moreover, I acknowledge a certain
primacy of one knowledge over the other unless we accept a,
philosophically speaking, unacceptable syncretism. Thus the
two basic attitudes are subdivided into four.
The first attitude consists in applying Morgan's law to Faith
and Reason taken as a theoretical whole without any further
analysis and in giving priority to Reason over Faith. In other
words, both the religious doctrine and the philosophical system
remain unanalysed into a set of propositions when the logical
operations are applied to them. Moreover, Faith is unconditionally under the control of Reason. Sure of his own per-

ELEUTHERE WINANCE

sonal reflection, the religious thinker, facing an unconditional
"either-or" concerning the truth-value of his belief and his
system which cannot coexist as both true, chooses his philosophical outlook as not-false, namely, as true. By doing so, he
rejects his Faith for the benefit of his Reason: he is a rationalist in a theological sense. In tllis sense he professes a doctrine
according to which any religious knowledge that transcends the
capabilities of human reflection is simply rejected. From thls
perspective Reason is the sufficient and necessary condition
which founds religious belief. No Revelation from God makes
sense and can be a priori acceptable. A believer who adopts
this attitude has entirely lost the Faith. If, according to this
extreme attitude, either an insight into a self-evident truth or
a demonstration from axioms is required for every valid assertion, there is no longer any room whatsoever for Christian
Faith. 9
The second attitude like the first keeps the priority of Reason
over Faith but, thanks to a deeper logical analysis, weakens
the opposition between the two types of knowledge. It presupposes that the denial of a theory does not necessarily imply
the total rejection of the whole theory. For a theory can be
regarded as the conjunction of many statements. Consequently, its denial amounts to applying Morgan's law. And so, if
Faith is denied, the negation is no longer a massive discard of
all the dogmas. Considered as the conjunction of several propositions to which Morgan's law is applied, the Creed is denied if
at least one of its articles is denied. Since the denial of this
conjunctive statement which constitutes the Creed amounts
to the disjunction of the denied dogma, what is logically
required is the denial of at least one article as false with the
others remaining true. 10 A believer who adopts this attitude
will keep his Creed intact except for at least one dogma or
-(Faith & Reason)· = ·-Faith v -Reason.
Reason ·
-Faith. In other words, if I maintain Reason, then I reject Faith.
10 -Faith) · = · (M & T & ... & H)
Then, -(Faith)·=· -Mv-T · v ... v-H)
One statement, at least, has to be rejected or denied as false.
9

THE COEXISTENCE

OF FAITH AND REASON

285

perhaps several others. In principle he accepts Revelation as
a source of knowledge but reserves for himself the right to
control God's teaching. Reason has no longer an unchallenged
primacy as in the first attitude; nevertheless, it supervises the
content of belief. By assuming this claim for supervision the
believer will make a choice among the truths proposed to him
by his Creed. From a strict etymological viewpoint, without
the deprecatory connotation resulting from history, he may be
called a " heretic." 11
The third attitude consists in applying Morgan's law to
Faith and Reason taken as a theoretical whole without any
further analysis and in giving priority to Faith over Reason. 12
Confident of the truth of his belief, moreover so confident that
Reason can be and is overruled, the religious thinker will simply
reject philosophical reftection. 13 For him, the problems to
which philosophy claims to be able to give an answer are no
longer solved by the rational method. This believer may be
called a fideist, namely, a man who implicitly or explicitly professes that Reason is unable to teach anything concerning
metaphysical or even ethical issues, because in these matters
Faith alone is the source of certain knowledge. Fideism can
be regarded as a form of skepticism which is pragmatically
corrected by religious belief. It can be also a form of escapism
which does not dare to face criticism and reflection. In any
case, as antithetic to rationalism fideism is not at all a help for
religion. For if Reason is undervalued to the point of being
denied any philosophical thought, some will suspect that
religion has no longer anything to do with sound human
behavior. Blind feeling, pragmatic decision, subjective choice
11

This term "heretic " comes from the verb ro alpeiP, to choose; alpepts means

"choice."

-(Faith & Reason)· = ·-Faith v -Reason
Then, Faith · -) · Reason. In other words, if I maintain Faith, then I have to
reject Reason.
13 Some Apologetes were opposed to Greek philosophy (Tatian, Tertullian);
Peter
Damian in the Middle Ages was not inclined to welcome logic; Ockham was a
skeptic in metaphysics; Beautin in the 19th century had no confidence in human
reason. All of them were fideists because they relied upon Faith for vital truths.
10

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will be the impression made upon minds for which truth is the
greatest concern. As a matter of fact, the Church has always
defended the right and the power of Reason. 14
The fourth, attitude, like the second, will consist in accepting
both philosophy and religion, thanks to a deeper logical analysis which weakens the opposition between them but which
accepts the right of Faith to supervise Reason. 15 There is here
again an application of the principle according to which the
denial of a conjunction does not necessarily entail the negation
of all its conjuncts. In the case of a conflict arising from philosophical statements contradictory to the propositions of
Faith, the philosopher is invited by the believer to correct his
philosophy. These statements which disagree with Faith, provided it has been established that they convey the same meaning, have, of course, to be rejected. But a further reflection
must deal either with the principles themselves from which the
heterodox conclusions have been derived or with the method
according to which they have been deduced. This work of
rejection and correction amounts to a logical negative control
of Reason by Faith. It is, indeed, a control, since an evaluation,
a restraint, a test is exercised concerning the truth of philosophical knowledge. This control is logical since it presupposes the
application of logical principles, namely, the principle according
to which the falsehood of a consequent implies either the falsehood of the antecedent if the conditional is true or the invalidity of the consequence if the antecedent is true, and the
principle according to which there is an impossibility of affirming two contradictory statements, rejecting by this rule the
theory of the " double truth " which has sometimes been attributed to some medieval thinkers. 16 This control is negative
since it is only limited to detecting an error from the viewpoint
"Vatican I affirmed strongly the ability of reason to know God against the
skepticism of the 19th century. Vatican II also affirmed the right of personal
conscience to guide human behavior.
15 -(Reason)·=·
-(P & Q& R .... & Z)
-(Reason)·=· -Pv-Qv-R .... v-Z.
16 This theory, according to the judgment of Prof. Van Steenberghen, has been
erroneously attributed by Mandonnet to Siger de Brabant.

THE COEXISTENCE

OF FAITH AND l'tEASON

of Faith. If Faith invites us to correct ourselves, it does not
tell us per se how to proceed in rectifying the system. The
error is pointed out but the process of verification has to be
rationally founded. It is truly the policy of " help yourself."
It is evident that the correction has to be made in the system
itself from the strict standpoint of reason: new analysis of
the immediate data, critical investigation into the basic principles, careful check of the discursive thought. 17 Whereas a
thinker is warned by the Church against error, no philosopher
can found the certainty of his system upon the agreement of its
conclusions with the articles of Faith. For in logic an antecedent is not true on account of the truth of its consequent.
At most, a certain probability can be conjectured. The situation of philosophy in regard to the Creed is to some extent.
similar to the situation of a physical theory in regard to facts. 18
17 Thomas Aquinas was convinced that he corrected Aristotle's
doctrine by a
better understanding of the principles of the Stagyrite.
The four attitudes can be summarized in the following schema concerning Faith
and Philosophy.
(F & P) ·
· (Antinomy)
Antinomy is rejected as false
Then,- (F & P)
Then,-FV-P
I) P,-Fv-P

-F
a) absolute rejection of Faith; Philosophy is called
rationalistic and closed in Blondel's sense.
b) relative rejection -F · = · -M •v -M .. v -H; at
least, one article is rejected.
2) F,-Fv-P

-P
a) absolute rejection of Philosophy-fideistic or anti-in·
tellectualistic attitude (condemned by the Church) .
b) relative rejection; -P · = · -Qv-R. ... -Z
attitude of the orthodox Fathers and Doctors in the
course of history.
18 Summa Theol., I, q. 32, a. 1, ad 2. St. Thomas is dealing with theological
theories which are similar to atronomical theories. These theories are not necessarily true because their consequences agree with the facts. If a theological theory
which " agrees " with the dogmas is not necessarily true, this is a fMtiiYI"i true
concerning a philosophy in agreement with Faith. Cf. II de Cael. et Mund., lect.
8 sq.

*

*

*

*

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ELEUTHERE WINANCE

The fourth and last attitude may suggest a new way of
philosophizing which could be called "Christian Philosophy."
As a matter of fact, this expression belongs to the title of a
famous work of Prof. Etienne Gilson, The History of Christian
Philosophy in the Middle Ages. In the late twenties and early
thirties this notion of " Christian Philosophy " became the
subject of long, animated, and subtle controversies among the
outstanding philosophers of that day .19 Those who approached
the problem from the viewpoint of history were inclined to
recognize as valid the concept of " Christian Philosophy " on
account of the undeniable impact of Christian thought on
Western culture. Contrariwise, those who approached the problem from the viewpoint of the Eidos were rather disposed to
reject this notion as invalid and illegitimate or to accept it with
cautious and explanatory restrictions.
There is a distinction which may help to clarify the discussion and to weaken the sharp opposition between two tendencies, both of which are legitimate. It is the distinction which
separates the concrete expression of " Christian Philosopher "
from the abstract phrase " Christian Philosophy." The first
aims at the order of facticity, the second at the order of eidetic
necessity. I believe that the first expression makes sense; but
I do not think that the second, strictly speaking, can avoid the
criticism of being nonsensical. Historians are right in maintaining that for a period of history philosophy grew under Christian
influence and environment. But philosophers are also correct in
denying that philosophy at any time becomes in its very
essence a sort of by-product of Christianity.
Consequently, I accept the concept of "Christian Philosopher " as a compound one, provided, of course, it is understood
as follows. A Christian philosopher is a thinker who, logically
speaking, elaborates his philosophy from his own experience
and his reason alone: pgychologically speaking, however, he can
be directed by hints or suggestions inspired by his Faith; rationally and religiously speaking, he accepts a negative control of
19 Bnmscwig, Brehier, Gilson, Maritain, Blondel, in France, around 1929, were
engaged in this controversy.

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289

his reflection by the same Faith, as explained above. First, the
logical elaboration does not distinguish a Christian philosopher
from a non-Christian; both use the same reason in the same
way, with the same experience, and with the same goal: truth.
Nothing more need be said on this. Second, psychological
direction means that the philosopher is, as a matter of fact,
interested in statements of Faith which can have an epistemological, metaphysical, or moral bearing. These statements have
to be considered by the philosopher as pure " working hypotheses" which have to be re-thought in a philosophical framework, recast in terms of philosophical categories, and demonstrated now only from philosophical principles. And so, nothing
will be accepted unless it has been reshaped by reason, its
criteria and its method. When we speak of philosophical statements of Faith, we mean at most, except in a specific case,
philosophical truths or philosophical horizons in a pre-systematic stage. As soon as they are assumed by the philosopher they
are given a special treatment to put them in a genuine philosophical status. Third, the negative control amounts to what
has been described above in the case of the fourth attitude
if the essential elements are taken into consideration. But here
new precisions and clarifications have to be given if its exercise
and domain are considered. First, I believe that the control
does not have to be conceived necessarily as the operation of
an "Administrative Power," such as the " Curia Romana" or
the late " Holy Office." For it is in the depth of his consciousness that a thinker, sincere in respect to himself and faithful
to his Church, will perceive the struggle of " meanings " and
the conflict of " values." Entangled in this predicament, he
will try to find a solution without hurting either his reason or
his Faith. In case he fails to discover this solution, he would
remain consistent with himself in saying: "I do not know,"
taking as his own the words of Descartes, the Prince of Rationalists: "We shall have no difficulty in believing (the mysteries
of Incarnation and the Blessed Trinity) although we do not
understand them very clearly. For we must not find it strange
that there is in God's nature that which is immense, and in

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what he has done, many things which transcend the ability of
our mind." 20 Second, assuming, as above, that the domain
of contention between Faith and Reason is the intersection of
the truths which are both revealed and demonstrable (or
revealable and demonstrated) , it is necessary to distinguish
two ways of belonging to this class: either the membership
of a truth in the class is explicit, by itself, or the membership
is implicit, on account of consequences. The first way need not
be explained; the second way has to be clarified. This second
way makes it possible for a philosophical opinion to be censured
in the name of a " Mystery." Let us make this clear by an
example. In the philosophical theory which defines a person
by its actual consciousness we shall verify a case in which a
set of premisses entails conclusions which do not easily agree
with orthodoxy. Since there are, indeed, two levels of consciousness in Christ, the human and the divine, it would follow
from the conjunction of this statement with the assumed
theory of consciousness that there are two persons in the
Lord; but this consequence is formally contrary to the traditional teaching of the Church. From this case it is easy to see
that the possibility of censorship of a theory, such as a theory
of consciousness in our specific predicament, results from the
philosophical implications of the religious truths. This theological illustration is an instance of a general principle which is
rejected by some philosophers or some theologians when they
exclude metaphysics either from logic, or from ethics, or from
Revelation, respectively. 21 I concede that in its specific technicality any science relies upon its own principles and method
without integrating in its body of knowledge philosophical principles, with the exception of sciences of man. Nevertheless, any
science presupposes a certain amount of philosophical commitments on the part of the scientist himself which condition the
possibility of his research. 22 Consequently, even the superDescartes, Principles of Philosophy, Part I, Prine. XXV.
All the contemporary tendencies which try to elaborate a logic without metaphysics or an ethics based only on facts cannot give an ultimate answer concerning
their own science.
•• Edmund Husserl Logische Untersuchungen, I Prolegomena. !'ld edition, chap.
I,§ 5.
20

01

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291

natural order does not escape the grip of a metaphysical
doctrine, either realist or idealist. Therefore, a Mystery always
contains an infra-structure of epistemological, metaphysical,
and ethical significance. This underlying philosophy is not
expressed in technical terms or linked to an elaborate system.
It presents itself at least as a confused horizon which is already
there, even if no one dares to be concerned about it. Therefore, even the truths which belong to the class of the Revealed
per se can indirectly, of course, belong per accidens, on account
of their necessary presuppositions, to the intersection of Faith
and Reason. Consequently, it is not superfluous to ask whether
a doctrine of idealistic inspiration can fit a religious doctrine
which seems to contain an implicit theory of an " embodied
consciousness " and of the facticity of " historical events." In
other words, the mysterious order of God in himself and his
love for mankind, which is per se expressed by strictly revealed
truths, presupposes a set of conditions, at most necessary,
which are precisely formulated through philosophical positions
to be put in the intersecting class of revealed and demonstrated
truths. The nominalist thinkers of the late Middle Ages could
exclude the supernatural order from any metaphysical jurisdiction whatsoever; however, this was not at all the mind of
Thomas Aquinas. Consequently, a seemingly innocent statement can, indirectly, shake a revealed truth by annihilating
one of its necessary conditions of intelligibility. From this
viewpoint Descartes was very concerned to show how his philosophy would not destroy the traditional belief in the Real
Presence in the Eucharist. 23
Now, I do reject the concept of "Christian Philosophy" if
this expression means a notion constituting an intelligible unit
able to be defined in itself. It is, indeed, a " hybrid notion "
which according to Aristotle's logic cannot be defined as such.
In a strict sense, there is no such system of thought called
" Christian Philosophy " insofar as " Philosophy " is taken in
•• Descartes, Principles of Philosophy, Part IV, Prine. CCVII: "Nevertheless,
all my opinions are submitted to the Authority of the Church." Answers to the 6th
Objections concerning Eucharist.

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WINANCE

its modem sense. 24 The reason is that any philosophy is at least
a set of statements based exclusively upon the insight of reason
and its discursive activity. It would be difficult to reject the
very common affirmation that philosophy is essentially rational.
A research of this type relies only upon experience, reflection,
intuition, understanding, and logic. But any type of thought
essentially characterized as Christian would include a new source
of knowledge, namely, Revelation which transcends both insight and reasoning. Consequently, on the one hand, philosophy is the conjunction of strictly rational statements; on the
other hand, Christian thought is not the conjunction of strictly
rational statements; insofar as it includes also revealed truths.
Since no system of thought can be both rational and nonrational, a " Christian Philosophy" would be a system which
implies a contradiction in its methological procedure.
In a broad sense, a " Christian Philosophy " is a philosophy
which both respects the revealed doctrine and remains" open"
to the possibility of Revelation. This relation of " courtesy "
does not intrinsically change the nature of the philosophical
reflection since it has nothing to do with its constitutive
elements, namely, its concepts, its methods, and its propositions.
As a matter of fact, from almost the beginning of Christianity
there has existed a type of speculation which borrows its
principles both from Faith and Reason; this inquiry is truly a
type of knowledge of its own that is, sui generis, neither Creed
nor Philosophy. It has been traditionally called "Theology"
or " Sacred Science." It would be confusing now to call it
" Christian Philosophy.''
After reading this logical note, are some not tempted to say:
"This is intolerable language. How could anyone accept it? " 25
ELEUTHERE WINANCE,

0. s. B.

Claremont Graduate School
Claremont, California
24 Christian
Doctrine has been called by some Fathers the true Philosophy
insofar as " Philosophy " means a way of life or a practical knowledge.
25 John 6:60.

ANALOGY AND "KINDS" OF THINGS

T

HE CONSIDERATIONS WHICH follow arose chiefly
from reflections on two treatments of the problem of
analogy by I. M. Bochenski. The first appeared in this
journal over twenty years ago/ and the second formed an
appendix to The Logic of Religion. 2 Both are excellent analyses of the problem. Nevertheless, there are difficulties which
seem to resist solution by means of the proposals put
forth by Bochenski. It is these difficulties to which I address
myself here, following which I consider three questions which
stem from them and are of the utmost importance in achieving
a proper cataloging of the problems of analogy. The purpose
of such an enterprise is heuristic. It is to be hoped that my
remarks, which are not definitive, can contribute somewhat to
the motion of the ongoing debate on analogy, whether this be
by means of further developing the scheme set forth by
Bochenski, or by suggesting some alternate route to the heart
of the problem.
By way of brief summary of Bochenski's analysis, it should
first be noted that it depends upon the following formulation of
the workings of language. Words are construed as visual or
auditory marks which "mean" certain properties of objects.
This relation is expressed in the formulaS (a, f, x), or" a means
f in x." Thus, "red" stands for the red of my car. Given a
second expression which is meaningful, S (b, g, y) ,3 any relation
which might obtain between the two terms a and b would be
expressed by the formula R (a, b, f, g, x, y): "a which stands
for f in x is related to b which stands for g in y." Univocal
1 "On Analogy,"
The Thomist, 11 (1948), pp. 424-447. Reprinted in LogicoPhilosophical Studies, ed. A. Menne (Dordrecht, 1961), pp. 97-117.
• (New York, 1965), pp. 156-162.
3 Presumably
there is a misprint in 50.12 of The Logic of Religion. Cf. "On
Analogy," 4.

293

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JAMES J. HEANEY

terms would be those in which a and b were of the same form
(" Isomorphic ") , and f and g were identical properties, while
x and y were different objects: "red" in "a red house" and
"a red car." Ambiguous or equivocal terms, among which he
classes analogous expressions, are those in which a and b are
isomorphic, while neither the properties f and g nor the objects
x and y are identical: " red " in " a red house " and " a red
herring." The relation of ambiguity or equivocation can thus
be formalized as:
(1)

Am(a, b,f,g,x,y) for S(a,f,x) · S(b,g,y) ·
· I(a,b) · f#g · x#y.4

In the earlier work he then tried to account for analogy in
terms of this definition, adding only that there must be some
further distinguishing factor to set analogy apart from other
instances of equivocation, expressed as:
(2)

An(a,b,f,g,x,y)

=Dt.Am(a,b,f,g,x,y)

· F. 5

The factor F is then interpreted according to the traditional
notions of attribution and proportionality.
A third move which appears in the earlier work, and continues on as the basis of the later, is the notion of analogy as
"isomorphy." In it, very possibly because of the difficulties
involved in treating analogous meaning as a subclass while
defining it by means of an added characteristic, Bochenski
has opted for a limitation of those terms to he considered
analogous to relational predicates alone. Once again, analogy
is defined in terms of equivocity, this time with the added
stipulations that there must be relations involved, and that a
further relation of " isomorphy " must hold between these
relations. "Isomorphy" means that the relations have the
same formal properties, e. g., transitivity, symmetry, reflexivity,
ect., in common. The formula given to describe this is:
• The Logic of Religion, 50.14; "On Analogy," 5.4.
5 " On Analogy," 8.2. The notation has been modified in favor of the simplicity
of the later treatment.

ANALOGY AND "KINDS"

(3)

OF THINGS

Q95

An(a, b, f, g, x, y) = Dt. Ae (a, b, f, g, x, y) ·
(EP, Q) (fPx · gQy · PsmorQ) .6

The advantages of such a definition are clear: it very neatly
accomodates the earlier divisions of analogous meaning as
relations, solves the subclass problem by using a genuine subclass (relational words) as its basis and founds the strength of
analogous discourse on a fairly solid characteristic, identity of
formal properties. The historical precedent for such a treatment is to be found in the nineteenth century in the work of
Mill and his predecessor, Whately. 7
As indicated at the outset, the sophistication and completeness of such a scheme are plainly undeniable. Difficulties do
arise, however, when we begin examining examples in an effort
to uncover what the practical value of such a formulation
would be for the study of religious and theological language.
Bochenski's example, a comparison of "John sees a cow here"
and" John sees the truth of the first theorem of GOdel," seems
to me to be rather a lame one for the following reasons. First
of all, the argument for the latter of these two expressions being
analogous to the former relies on the rather tenuous assumption
that " seeing " a cow and " seeing " something which is " the
truth " of a theorem must be construed as sharing something
in addition to being spelled the same way. In actual use,
however, this is not the case: physiological and intellectual
"seeing" are in fact never confused with each other. The
blind man, on having his sight restored, does not say "Now I
understand," unless it is clear that he is talking about something else: a previously unintelligible correlation of tactile data
for instance. Likewise, no one mistakes the use of the expression " I see," uttered during the explanation of a complex
logical proof, for a declaration of the physical ability to see,
unless his sight were previously impaired and something extra""On Analogy," 17.2. Cf. The Logic of Religion, 50.41. The notation has again
been modified in favor of simplicity.
7 J. S. Mill, A System
of Logic, 8th ed. (London, 1930), II, iii, 20, p. 364.
Richard Whately, Elements of Rhetoric, ed. D. Ehninger (Carbondale, 1963), pp.
91ft.

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JAMES J. HEANEY

ordinary had incidentally come to pass. In response to the
proof, " I see " is clearly an accepted substitute for " I understand," and not for " I am experiencing visual sense-data." It
seems to me that any further claims for the second use of
"seeing" being analogous to the first would have to rely upon
the sort of etymological speculation which attempts to connect
such expressions as "light" and "truth," or "vision" and
"understanding," but I do not think these are too germane
logically.
Even granted, however, that there is a connection between
these two uses of the expression " seeing " which could be
termed " analogous," there remain some other problems of
application. Suppose that we use as an example the sentence
"John sees God," which I take to be a legitimate theological
sentence describing one aspect of John's future life in beatitude.
How, then, are we to take this sentence in comparison with
the previous two, "John sees a cow here" and "John sees
the truth of the first theorem of Godel "? Quite clearly we do
not want to classify "seeing" a cow and "seeing" God
together, but neither do we wish to so classify "seeing" the
truth of a theorem and " seeing " God, if for no other reason
than that we feel neither of these objects is a fit comparison
for God: God is neither a physical object nor a mathematical
theorem. On the other hand, other examples indicate that we
may not be totally justified in considering a relational term
analogical simply because of a difference in kind of the objects
it is predicated of. For instance, would we be so quick to say
that the relational term " has " occurred analogically in some
of the following: "Peter has a red hat," " Peter has the
sniffles," and " Peter has a holiday "? I do not think so, if
for no other reason than there being no other, more straightforward, form of expressing these. I think it is thus clear that
there is more plausibility than we would have suspected to the
claim that " Peter has the beatific vision " incorporates an
entirely ordinary use of " has," unhampered by the difference of
the object term "beatific vision." If so, and "John has the
beatific vision" is as tradition would have it, equivalent to

ANALOGY

AND "KINDS"

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297

"John sees God," is it then so clear that "sees" in "John sees
God" must be an analogous usage?
While I do not think that the foregoing objections need
necessarily invalidate Bochenski's analysis of the various modes
of analogy, it would still seem that there is a great deal more
to be said on these issues. My own feeling is that much of
the problem arises from the generality of the use of " identity "
in his formulations, as well as the two-valued manner in which
he uses it. There is, after all, a whole range of instances going
from "utterly the same," " the same," " similar," " somewhat
alike," " clearly different," " hardly similar," and " dissimilar "
to " of a completely different kind." Further, such instances
include not only objects but also properties and even uses of
expressions: cataloging everything in a two-valued fashion
leaves us wondering if "seeing" a herd of cows or "seeing" a
stampede could not also be taken as analogous usages, in short,
in epistemological chaos. In an effort to find some solid ground
in the matter, I would like to consider three questions which
are clearly important here: what it is to be a " different kind "
of thing; whether there can be an object which is indescribable
in principle, i. e., whether a thing can be so different that we
can say nothing directly of it; and lastly, whether there is a
binding between objects and their predicates such that it would
create a hindrance to describing other objects, these latter
being of a different kind. Of these questions, the last is the
most difficult to answer satisfactorily, although I think the
grounds for the answer are quite sound.
(i) . I should like to begin by suggesting that to say two
things are of a different kind must be something very much like
saying that there are two meanings we might ascribe to the
sentence " This book is incomplete." The first meaning would
be that some physical object, a book, was lacking an essential
physical part, say twenty pages in the middle of the third
chapter. The second would be that some book, here taken as
the intellectual progeny of an author, did not sufficiently treat
of material relevant to its subject: a history of philosophy
which made no mention of middle platonism for instance. For

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JAMES J. HEANEY

convenience I would like to call the respective objects and
properties " book1," " book2," " incomplete1 " and " incomplete2." To save unnecessary labor I will also assume it to be
obvious that, while these expressions are prima facie monadic
predicates, they could also be expressed relationally and that
any conclusion we come to about the former will hold true of
the latter.
The first thing we might notice about the distinction between
" book1 " and " book2 " is that, while the sentence given, " This
book is incomplete," may be apparently ambiguous, we are in
no doubt as to what conditions would have to obtain for the
sentence to be disambiguated. Thus, if the speaker wishes to
make plain what he is talking about, he has merely to say
"Well, there are pages missing," or" The treatment of Numenius was a bit scanty." Likewise, we are aware of the conditions
which might make each of these statements either false or
inapplicable: either all the pages may be there and the topic
thoroughly considered or, on the other hand, there may be no
book to talk about, and if there is a book, then it may have
been about an entirely different topic to which the judgment
of its completeness is irrelevant. The difference between
"book1" and "book2" is therefore not at all like the difference
between two things, like a chair and a stool. Of a chair and a
stool, which clearly are different kinds of things, we find a
somewhat softer relation of mutual discreteness to obtain:
some stools could be chairs if they had backs, and some chairs,
with or without backs, could be used as stools, or perhaps as
a third kind of thing, a hassock. In regard to books, a " book1 "
does not become a " book2 " in any sense merely by the addition of a text, nor does a " book2 " become a " book1 " by being
printed, although the result of both these actions is the " publishing " of both sorts of things: consider the similar ambiguity
of" This book was published in 1637."
We also notice in the comparison of books to articles like
chairs and stools that, although the latter are different kinds
of things in some ways, they are the same kinds of things in
others, i.e., both are furniture, are made of certain sorts of

ANALOGY

AND "KINDS"

OF THINGS

299

materials, and have useful and/or decorative functions. We can
characterize either a stool or a chair in the same terms. On the
other hand, except for the cases of ambiguity already cited, this
is not true of" book1" and "book2 ": descriptions of these two
sorts of things are either ambiguous or mutually exclusive. As
already indicated, where there is an ambiguity of properties as
well, as in " incomplete1 " and incomplete2," the difference is
plainly decidable by asking what would have to be done to
make it complete. Further, a" book1" is never "incomplete2,"
nor is a "book2 " ever "incomplete1 ": consider the sentence
" In this copy the author did not pay enough attention to
Ammonius."
Lastly, in reference to existence conditions, it is important
to note two points. The first is rather trivial, viz., that whereas
a " book1 " may be said to " exist " or not in the same way as
things like chairs and stools do, " books2 " do not. A " book1 "
of blank pages, as a copybook or a notebook, is still said to
be a " book," and is not, generally speaking, said to exist if
it is not empirically evidenced. " Books2 " on the other hand,
may exist in any number of ways, in mente, or in pectore
auctoris. Even were we to say that a" book1" and a" book2"
were both " potential " or " intentional " entities, they would
still be so in very different ways. The second point is of
somewhat greater interest, that the falsification conditions for
both these sorts of things are different: there are some cases
of existence conditions of " booksz " which would not be falsifiable in principle. By this I mean that a " book2 " which exists
only in mente partakes of the truth-functional immunity of
future contingencies, while remaining an entity to be haggled
over in the present tense.
(ii) . Given, then, these characteristics of something being
a different " kind " of thing from something else, we must now
consider the next question which arises from this, viz., whether
there can be an object which is in principle indescribable. It
should be understood quite clearly that this is not the same
as the question "Does an object x, such that it is indescribable,
exist? " To answer such a question would be outside the scope

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JAMES J. HEANEY

of the present discussion, and perhaps of any discussion,
describability and existence being notoriously independent of
each other. In the present context, it will not be possible to
avoid the problem of existence altogether, but I content myself
with the oblique remarks which do treat of it here, all of which
are intended to be as neutral to the problem as possible.
Considering the three previously given conditions for an
object's being a different kind of thing, and taking them each
as being at least a sufficient, if not a necessary condition for
this distinction's being made, it is apparent right from the
outset that the notion of an object of such a different kind as to
be indescribable is in trouble. The first condition would have it
that, if an object is of a different sort, then it is distinguished
from other objects by the simple fact of different things being
said of it. The case of an indescribable object runs into
difficulties because, since nothing can be said of it, it is in principle indistinguishable from anything else. Pantheism, it would
appear, accepts such a version of things. Should we not wish to
accept this, however, the alternative left open to us is to
consider indescribability itself as a description, in fact, as a
" definite " description, since we could in principle never know
if there were more than one indescribable object: they would
all be the same and could not be differentiated. This view,
however it may solve the problem for us, is clearly self-contradictory. Both the second and the third conditions, mutually
exclusive descriptions and different existence conditions, share
the fate of the first. An indistinguishable object has no mutually exclusive description, and either " exists " itself or conditions
which apply to it must be taken as predicates, and hence as
in some way differentiating. I take it that these arguments
adequately refute the claim that to say an object is indescribable is to say the class of its predicates is a null class and is
so in principle.
(iii) . The null class version of indescribability is not, however, the only one. I£ we call it the" strong form," there is also
an alternative and weaker claim, namely, that there is an
object such that none of the predicates available to us describe

ANALOGY

AND "KINDS"

OF THINGS

801

it, or more formally, (Ex) (P)
(Px), in which the domain of
predicates is finite. The substance of such a view, in the classic
form, is not that the object is indescribable in principle as
above, nor yet that the object is one describable in principle
but totally outside our universe of discourse. Rather, such an
object, God, is very much within our realm of discourse, but
there is some hindrance in the proper application of terms of
the language to him. The substance of the hindrance is that
such terms are truly applicable to earthly things alone, and if
said of God imply the imperfections of these earthly things.
This raises the third question I wish to consider, what sort of
connection there is between properties and the objects to which
they are ascribed.
A puzzlement which besets us at the outset in working at
such a question is that of determining just what sort of mistake
is involved when we use human language of God. At first sight,
it would appear that it should be called a " category mistake "
of some form to say " God is wise " when " God " is not such an
object that the predicate " wise " can properly apply to him.
This, however, is not a very satisfactory approach to the problem, assimilating as it does statements like "God is wise" to
others like "The number 3 is green " on the one hand, or to
more felicitous but nevertheless metaphorical sorts on the other
hand, "New York is a summer festival " for example. Category
mistakes are false, nonsensical or metaphorical, and we would
not like to say that " God is wise " is any one of these unless we
wished to sustain a rather extreme form of negative theology.
Another way to get into the problem is to examine a bit
more closely just what a category mistake might consist in
logically. For example, simple predications are not at all where
the difficulty is lodged: to say that something is a P is never
a problem logically, it either is or it isn't. The source of the
problem is rather that, besides being a P, x may also be an F,
and P and F may be mutually exclusive. Thus, as in the
previous examples, numbers are not also colored objects, and
the class of colored objects does not include the class of
numbers. In regard to the second example, while" New York

S02

J AMl!JS J. HEANEY

is a summer festival " is a phrase with a sound descriptive tum
to it, it is still not immensely informative in a literal way:
there would be no answer to the question "Which festival?"
Metaphors, conundrums, and paradoxes all depend on the fact
that there is a sense in which they may be taken which is
correct, though not literally so. I think, however, that we
should be somewhat hesitant to group " God is wise " with such
expressions, on the grounds it does not have this same sort of
" sense " of being true. " God is wise " is not at all like " man
has three legs in old age " in the riddle of the sphinx, largely
because the latter is quite literally false. While we may well
argue and create distinctions about the falsifiability of " God
is wise," it nevertheless is clearly so in a different manner from
riddles and metaphors.
A further elaboration of the initial argument is to consider
all applications of the expression " wise " to be carrying under
their cloaks a concealed modifier, "humanly" or "divinely,"
for example. On this view, to say " God is wise" is to say
" God is wise a.s man is wise " or " God is humanly wise," both
of which are plainly false. Despite this, however, they are
claimed to be partially true insofar as some meaning carries
over from the first to the second, and it is this partial truth
which prompts us to say the second uses of " wise " are analogical.
Such an argument, however, seems to be altogether false for
two reasons. One we have already seen in referring to the
expression "sees" in "John sees God," viz., that difference in
the objects referred to is not always sufficient grounds for inferring complete equivocity of meaning. Neither is it grounds for
claiming that there is a difference of meaning any greater than
that to be expected in most instances wherein the objects under
consideration are not the same or even the same in kind. Ryle
makes the same point using a different example:
Consider the adjective "punctual." It can be used to characterize a person's arrival at a place, the person who arrives there,
his character, and even the average character of a class of persons.
It would be absurd to compare the punctuality of a man on a

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303

particular occasion with that of his arrival on that occasion; it
would be absurd to compare the punctuality of his character with
that of his arrival on a particular occasion; and it would be absurd
to compare the punctuality of Naval officers as a class with that of
a particular Naval officer.8
Thus, there is no single " proper " use for an expression, all
others being "category mistakes" of a sort, but rather the
range of use is continuous from one instance to another and
very much determined by convention as to its limits.
A second counterargument to such claims is to be seen in
one of the criteria given in (i) for an object's being of a
" different kind," i. e., that any apparently ambiguous use of an
expression to refer to things of different kinds can be readily
disambiguated either by asking for its falsification conditions or
by asking what else is to be said of it in the case under consideration. This is to say that uses of the expression " wise "
to refer to different objects do not have to lead to confusion of
attributes between one and the other: my old dog is " wise "
to stay around the hearth in cold weather and "unwise" if he
chases cars; standards for human wisdom are different and
more complex than those of canine wisdom. To say that different standards may likewise apply when we add the qualifier
" divine" to wisdom is not to argue by analogy but rather to
make an instance of a general theory of meaning as it applies
to cases of difference in kind. I take it that both these arguments demonstrate that the notion that predicates are somehow bound to their instantiations in such a manner as to carry
over from one to the other is an indefensible one, because
language is both a more precise and a more flexible tool than
the upholders of such a position wish to admit.

*

*

*

*

As indicated at the outset, I would like to present these
remarks as a stimulus for discussion. Surely, the problem of
how different things are to be described is one which is of
8 " Philosophical Arguments"
in Logical Positivism, ed. A. J. Ayer (New York,
1959)' p. 889.

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;rAMES ;r. HEANEY

crucial importance in determining how the doctrine of analogy
is to be handled in the light of contemporary discussions on
the theory of meaning. I cannot pretend that what has been
said here encompasses the problem thoroughly, but I do think
that the basic patterns of a challenge to the traditional formulations of the doctrine are reasonably evident in it. The tone
of these comments has been largely negative, but hopefully
not irreverently so: in the current debate over the meaning of
religious words it seems to be vital for the theologian to maintain that what he says, while it may be said in odd ways, is
not so strange and novel that it is completely off the edge of
our logical and linguistic maps. My feeling is that the doctrine
of analogy in some forms has a tendency to make it so and
that the formulation of it given by Father Bochenski has not
helped the situation a great deal, despite the fact that it was
his clear intention to do so. Hopefully, patient work at this
issue will make it somewhat clearer in the future what the
peculiarities of the theological language system are, and in such
a way that the work done will provide a working theological
tool for the systematician, much as did the doctrine of analogy
for Aquinas.
JAMES J. HEANEY

Yale University
New Haven, Conn.

A RESPONSE TO MR. HEANEY

M

R. HEANEY IS interested in developing the theory

of analogy beyond Fr. Bochenski's application to
formal languages to embrace ordinary language. Mentioning the limitations of Bochenski's important account of
analogy, in terms of the isomorphism of the formal properties
of relations, Heaney rightly observes that that account is not
general enough to satisfy our curiosity about sets of analogous
terms in ordinary language. In particular, we need to know
how difference of kinds among things is related to analogical
predication.
Heany's inquiry also seems limited by his not recognizing
or at least mentioning that analogy of meaning is omnipresent
in ordinary discourse. 1 And whatever the other limitations of
Bochenski's account, at least Bochenski makes clear what
analogy of meaning is and what conditions must obtain for
analogous predication to occur. Heaney's discussion does not
show this clarity about the conditions for analogy, and yet,
he feels confident that Bochenski errs in thinking " sees " is
analogous in the pair "John sees a cow here," "John sees
the truth of the first theorem of Godel." I can't understand
why Heaney thinks we must be able to confuse the two kinds
of seeing in order to be sure they have the requisite community
of meaning to be analogous. Just the opposite appears true
to me, if we have in mind a person who understands the
language. For one of the strengths of the analogy regularities
of natural language is that, if a person understands the use of
a certain term, P, with another term, S, where S belongs to a
1 See:
J. F. Ross: "A New Theory of Analogy" Proceedings of the ACPA,
1970; and "Analogy and the Resolution of some Cognitivity Problems," Journal
of Philosophy, Vol. LXVII, No. 20 (Oct. 22, 1970), pp. 725-746. (See also critical
comments by George I. Mavrodes, pp. 747-755.

305

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JAMES F. ROSS

pair of (appropriate) categorially contrasting terms (S and S'),
then the person will understand the use of P with the other
term, S', without any further explanation, provided only that
he understands how to use both members (SandS') of the
categorially contrasting pair with other predicates appropriate
to each (" the cow and "the truth of the theorem ") .
Heaney gets to the central issue when he observes, "On the
other hand, other examples indicate that we may not be totally
justified in considering a relational term analogical simply
because of a difference of kind of the objects it is predicated
of." That is quite right. Not just any difference makes a
difference; yet some differences in kind certainly do. Although
Socrates (male) and Xanthippe (female) differ in gender and
therefore in kind, that difference in kind does not affect the
sense of a common predicate, " is married to " or " is a person,"
though that difference will affect the sense of the same term
predicate "has babies." When the subjects contrast enough
in kind (in relation to the predicate), the same-term predicate
is correspondingly differentiated in meaning. In fact, that is
what analogy of meaning is: regularity-controlled meaning
differentiation (by semantic contagion or by contrast of modes
of ascription) of same-term occurrences in categorially contrasting discourse contexts;
The difficulty is to describe just what differences among
terms are categorial differences. And the first lesson that
history offers us is not to look for the basis of those differences
in our opinions or knowledge of the things designated by the
terms under discussion but rather to look to the semantic
functions of the terms: to found our theory of categorial
differences upon the fact that there are sem:mtical fields/ without pretending, at the outset at least, that categorial contrasts have metaphysical justifications. Heaney is right to
inquire into differences of kinds of things. I think, however,
2 See:
John Lyons: Structural Semantics (Oxford: Blackwell, 1963), and
lntroductioo to Theoretical Linguistics (Cambridge University Press, 1969),
Chapters 9 and 10.

A RESPONSE

TO MR. HEANEY

307

that he looks in the wrong place and finds wrong conditions of
difference.
I agree with Heaney that the case for saying that some terms
applied affirmatively to God are applied univocally with other
non-religious applications has not been adequately developed
or adequately refuted. Possibly "sees" in "John sees God"
is univocal with the occurrence such as "John sees the purple
cloud." Certainly the negative case, that such predication will
lead inevitably to anthropomorphism, has never been developed convincingly. But there is an additional problem that
faces Heaney, and anyone else who might want to say that
" wise " is univocal in " Socrates is wise " and " God is wise,"
namely, to provide some kind of explanation of what sameness
of meaning for same-term occurrences consists in. How can
we tell when same-term occurrences are univocal? What are
the constitutive and the identificatory criteria for univocity?
Heaney seems to think that if the entailments, the conditions
of falsification, of verification, etc., should happen to be different, then a pair of same-term occurences will not be univocal. But none of these things is a sufficient condition for
difference of meaning, and some of them are not necessary,
either. It is extremely difficult to provide a criterion of difference of meaning for two sentences (s-1, s-2) with respect
to a common term p; for some of the differences in entailments,
etc., are attributable to the subjects and no criterion to separate them is easily constructed.
Aquinas and Aristotle certainly believed that a difference
in the objects of which a relational term is predicated will
make a meaning-difference in the same-term occurences. This
object-language talk about differences in objects is just a brief
way of expressing claims about the categories of the predicate
or subject terms. Objects which are in categorial contrast,
insofar as they have same term predicates, have those predicates, in comparison to one another, analogously (as meaningdifferentiated through adjustment to the contrasting categories
of their complements). To say a substance is visible (e. g.,
" The color of its leaves is visible from here ") is to use " is

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JAMES F. ROSS

visible" analogously, because the modus mgnificandi of a predicate is adjusted to the modus essendi of the subject. Nothing
in one category can be anything at all in the same way as
something in another category. The absoluteness of categorial
difference for Aristotle and Aquinas seems to underlie the claim
that all the same predicates of two things belonging to different
categories must be analogous. This is certainly the doctrine
of St. Thomas.
And it is a doctrine we shall have to amend, at least
provisionally, because we do not have a satisfactory system
of categories. Although it is an empirical matter to map the
fields of terms in English, and although categories can be extrapolated from fields as exclusive classes of semantic fields, there
are a number of things we cannot know in advance, especially
whether there are any absolute categorial contrasts. For
instance, " the ball " and " the train " may contrast categorially with respect to the sentence frame " He caught NP ,"
but not with respect to the sentence frame "He saw NP."
Thus, those terms stand in relative categorial contrast with
respect to certain sentence frames. A "basic" categorial contrast is the contrast of two terms with respect to every term
belonging to the semantic field to which some term in a sentence frame with which they are in contrast belongs; thus a
basic categorial contrast is a relative categorial contrast
between two terms with respect to every term belonging to
the semantic field of some third term. And an absolute categorial contrast will obtain where there is no term with which
both terms may be concatenated. Because of the " higher "
terms which are available, e. g., "thing," "something or
another," etc., it is unlikely that any pair of terms is in absolute
categorial contrast, though this must be established more
particularly. If there are none, then basic contrasts will provide the grounds for our account of categories.
It seems to me that there is considerably greater potential
for our developing a theory of categorial differences by way
of an investigation of semantic fields than there is by developing such criteria as Heaney has suggested, chiefly because

A RESPONSE

TO MR. HEANEY

309

we already know that his conditions are not sufficient and in
some cases are not necessary even for a difference of meaning.
His proposal seems to come to this: the difference in two
things is a relevant difference in kind, founding an analogous
predication of a same-term predicate, if (a) the one thing could
never be the same thing as the other is; (b) the things have
different existence conditions; (c) the falsification conditions
for the assertions that there are such things are different. But
concealed in this account is the fact that the different existence
conditions and falsification conditions must themselves be of
different kinds and not simply different but of the same kind.
For, consider that Socrates and Plato are such that neither
thing could ever be the same thing as the other; their existence
conditions are different and the falsification conditions for
"Socrates exists" are different from the falsification conditions
for " Plato exists " ; yet it will not follow that the term
"exists" is analogous in the two cases. This shows that the
conditions of difference in kind which we have been given are
not sufficient, as Heaney claims. What we require is that if
these conditions differ, they must differ categorially; but that
is what we set out to explain!
Moreover, if we will allow analogous senses of "is the same
thing as," then we will not be able to state that categorially
different things are never the same as one another. The President of the United States is categorially different from Richard
Nixon, yet right now, Richard Nixon and the President of
the United States are the same thing, despite the fact that
t!te falsification conditions for " Richard Nixon exists " and
"The President of the United States exists" are different.
Under certain circumstances, things which belong to different
categories may be said to be the same because " is the same
thing as" is analogous, having transcategorial uses.
The mild criticism of Bochenski for using " is identical with "
as a two-valued predicate seems to come to nothing. For
Bochenski could easily introduce such additional predicates as
"is the same thing as," "is somewhat alike to," etc., into his
formal system. I do not see why Heaney thinks we will be

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JAMES F. ROSS

in an epistemological wasteland if we wonder whether " I see
a herd of cows," " I see a stampede," and " I see a cow " use
"see" analogously. I have no difficulty regarding them as
analogous same-term occurrences and see no special difficulties
for a theory of knowledge. And I cannot see what the talk
about "two-valued" cataloging of everything has to do with
the problem.
If there is any sense to the idea that meaning is use and
" use " is like " function " or "instrumentality " then " sees "
has similar but differing functions or instrumentalities in each
of the mentioned cases; it has differential but similar meanings.
And wherever, with respect to some contrasting terms (subjects, predicates, objects, etc.) , a function for a term can be
recognized which is partly similar to some use or function the
term already has with respect to one of the contrasting terms,
an analogous sense is developed by its being concatenated
with the contrasting term. If this is not noticed to be a general
feature of ordinary language semantics, philosophers will
develop the analogy theory too narrowly and will be unable to
account for the way analogy affects predicates in science.
theology and metaphysics. Analogy is not a rarity, it is a
semantic familiar in our linguistic lives.
The discussion of whether there can be an indescribable
object seems to be confused and not particularly germane to
an inquiry into analogy. Does the writer think that an indescribable object would be one about which nothing true could
be said? About which nothing could be known (regardless of
what could be said) ? About which all human assertions would
be false, even the contradictories of false statements? It is not
clear whether the assertion " x is describable " is itself a
description of x. Is the negation of a description also a description? Nor do I see how "mutually exclusive descriptions"
can both be true of anything. But leaving those questions
aside, I take it that Heaney is concerned to isolate a sense
in which someone might reasonably intend to claim that God
is indescribable. It appears that he thinks it would take the
form of a claim that some sort of a mistake, perhaps a category

A RESPONSE

TO MR. HEANEY

311

mistake, would be involved when we use human language
about God. And it also seems that he thinks there is no
rational foundation for the charge, first, because our puzzlement over God-statements is not like our puzzlement over
" The number three is green," and, second, because it is not
true that " predicates are somehow bound to their instantiations in such a manner as to carry over from one to another."
Now it seems to me that Heaney has stepped right onto
the threshold of a plausible analogy theory with this remark.
Predicates, subjects, objects (as shown in my papers note 1,
above) are partly bound to their discourse contexts by being
partly category-determined but can be found in contrasting
contexts as well, and yet, not in every contrasting context;
thus they are partly category-determinable. And the regularities of concatenation are the result of both their determinateness and their indeterminateness. Moreover, the senses
of terms adjust to the contexts. (" His handwriting is unintelligible." "His published papers are unintelligible."
"He
silenced the crowd." " He silenced the prosecution.") Those
adjustments of sense are not without regularities which might
be called rules or principles of analogous meaning differentiation. Upon these observations, it seems to me that some
patience and a healthy linguistic empiricism will build the rest
of a modem theory of analogy capable of achieving the explanatory effects for which the classical theories were designed.
JAMEs F. Ross
University of Pennsylvania

Philadelphia,Penna.

BOOK REVIEWS
Abortion: the Myths, the Realities, and the Arguments. By GERMAIN
G. GRISEZ. New York: Corpus Publications, 1970. Pp. 570. Cloth,
$15.00; paper, $6.95.
This is a major work that deserves wide reading and careful study.
Grisez, a philosopher at Georgetown University, treats one of our most
intensely debated moral and legal problems with outstanding completeness and depth. His work shows mastery of the vast literature on
abortion: he discusses all the important issues raised in biological, medical, legal, political, sociological, psychiatric, theological, and ethical treatments of the subject. It is by far the most comprehensive and most
penetrating discussion of the abortion question. Legislators, jurists, and
scholars who have a responsibility to participate in the current abortion
controversy should have this book.
The first three chapters are detailed analyses of the biological, medical,
and sociological aspects of the problem. There is a wealth of factual
information and a careful survey of all the most important interpretations
and arguments based on the data. But this is more than an encyclopediatype digest of a vast literature. Throughout intelligent criticism is bringing order and perspective to extremely complex questions.
A long chapter on religious views of abortion (pp. 117-84) is the
finest survey that has been done on the subject. Grisez studies the
attitudes of primitive religions toward abortion, and of Vedic, Zoroastrian,
and Egyptian sources; the Old and New Testaments; the various Jewish
traditions; the common Christian tradition and the later developments
of the Orthodox, Protestant, and Catholic communities. The roots of
many major and minor differences in attitude are exposed. But even
more impressive is the overwhelming witness of the Indo-European
religions to the transcendent value of human life, extending to great
reverence for prenatal life. For example, it is pointed out than in the
Vedas abortion has been counted among the worst of sins, because it
destroys a life so near to its divine origins and so rich in its possibilities.
The Old Testament literature is shown to express a philosophy of human
life (based on a personal relationship between God and the individual
even before birth) that established an atmosphere in the Jewish community
in which abortion could not and did not flourish.
But it was in Christianity that the notion of a person as a " bearer
of immeasurable and inalienable dignity " grew. In early Christianity
there was an intense and severe hostility to abortion. Confronted with

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313

the non-personal social philosophy of paganism, in which individuals were
too exclusively subordinated to the welfare of the community, Christian
teachers responded with emphatic insistence on the sacredness of each
person. The teaching of the early Fathers (their thought is splendidly
summarized on pp. 137-50) reveals their awareness of all the motives
that move men to abortion even today (including a real fear of overpopulation). But they reject abortion totally for basic reasons: " because
it is a type of homicide that is especially cruel, since the parents should
most especially love and care for the helpless life they have generated;
and because it violates the work of God and ignores his providence; . . .
because it is a form of discrimination against some of one's children in
favor of others; because it is an inhumane and dehumanizing act."
(p. 149)
The Protestant tradition, which was profoundly influential in shaping
American legislation aimed at protecting unborn life, has its roots in
this same basic Christian philosophy. But some recent Protestant statements take a sharply different position. Grisez shows that this trend
implies a profound alteration of principle. Formerly, transcendent value
was recognized in prenatal human life. Even in 1958 the Lambeth Conference insists that "The sacredness of (this) life is, in Christian eyes,
an absolute which should not be violated." But later declarations (e. g.,
the American Episcopal House of Bishops in 1967, and a documentAbortion: An Ethical Discussion, Westminster, 1967-from the Anglican
Church Assembly Board for Social Responsibility; Grisez criticizes
latter document sharply on pp. 283-86) indicate that the value of the
unborn is far from absolute. There are now a number of other values
that outweigh human life in the unborn and justify taking their lives.
The history of Catholic moral theology on the subject has never been
better treated. (pp. 165-84) Carefully chronicled here are the complex
debates affected by the distinction between animated and non-animated
fetuses until scientific developments secured the triumph of the immediate
animation theory; the controversies about therapeutic abortion; and the
major role consistently played by the Holy See in maintaining strong
faithfulness to the basic principles involved. Grisez suggests that, if certain
contemporary Catholic positions on the relationship between conscience
and authority prevail, unified Catholic witness to this sacredness of life
may also fail. (p. 184)
Chapter five treats the state of the legal question. The history of antiabortion laws reveals a complex interplay between the religious roots of
such legislation and the secular public opinion that was the immediate
force behind the laws. Grisez shows that such legislation was not based
simply on concern for the health of the mother but on a deep conviction on
the inviolability of human life, now seen more clearly in the fetus.

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BOOK REVIEWS

(pp.
The Western liberal tradition on the dignity of human life
indeed grew out of Judaeo-Christian sources. But the law followed secular
opinion more immediately than theological inspiration. Acceptance of
biological information revealing the humanity of the youngest prenatal
life led to legislation protecting that life before theologians had fully
absorbed the new data. And, though therapeutic abortion did not receive
general theological approval, the laws often sanctioned the practice in
cases where physicians judged it necessary for saving the mother's life.
Significantly, the nation that countered this trend and first gave broad
legal support to abortion was a nation with a radically different philosophy
of man from that of Christianity and the liberal West: Soviet Russia.
Equally important is Grisez's study of the origins of the British and American abortion movements, which exhibited strong hostility to any supernatural religious faith. Soviet practice was consistent with its theory
that the state need protect and foster individual lives only to the extent
that they are valuable for the purposes of the community. Western
atheistic humanism is perhaps less clear in its advocacy of abortion. It
often asserts a utilitarian morality not calculated to support any inviolable rights of each individual human person when these seem to oppose
alleged social advantages; yet it does not want to confess any open
denial of such rights.
Excellent criticisms of the legal reforms proposed by the American
Law Institute and the American Medical Association are given. The
first seems particularly unsatisfactory. Its model legislation is replete with
vague terms, which tend to give support for far wider abortion policies
than American public opinion is willing to support. Grisez reminds us that
polls consistently show that the vast majority of Americans oppose
abortion for socio-economic reasons, or in cases in which the mother
simply does not want the child. Other significant aspects of public
opinion are pointed out: women disapprove of abortion more than men
do; disapproval of abortion is strongest among those of deepest religious
convictions, who attend church frequently-among these differences between Protestants and Catholics are not great; and the poor disapprove
of abortion more than the prosperous.
Chapter six, "Ethical Arguments," is the most important chapter in
the volume. Grisez packs much into its pages: a discussion of the most
important contemporary approaches to the subject (as relativism, utilitarianism, situationism), a statement and defense of his own moral theory,
and a detailed study of the morality of abortion in various circumstances.
The positive exposition of his own moral philosophy is a splendid original expression of a realistic ethical philosophy. It presents a philosophy
of practical principles in a sophisticated form, calculated to stand against
the well-known contemporary objections to such a view; it is clear,
consistent, and persuasive. (pp.

BOOK REVIEWS

315

Clearly a critical question is: Is the embryo or fetus a human being?
Grisez insists on separating a factual question about humanity (" Is this
embro or fetus living, individual, and specifically human? ") from the
more important metaphysical or religious question of personality (" Is this
individual a person, to be treated as a subject of real rights? ") . (p. Q73)
The factual question is solved chiefly by reflecting on biological data.
At every stage from fertilization to birth and maturity there is clearly
present a reality that is living, individual, and distinctively human (biologically, genetically). Though problems about individuality arise from
a study of, e. g., twins, the individuality of the zygote relative to the
parent is evident from conception. Arguments against counting genetic
evidence as sufficiently decisive for the factual question are carefully
considered. Garret Hardin's analogy from blueprints (immanent possession of a genetic packet of information is said to make the zygote a
human no more than a blue print's possession of a house's structure makes
it a young house) and Rev. Joseph Donceel's return to a rather outmoded
Aristotelian view are shown to suffer, among other things, from a common
defeat: failure to reflect upon the living, immanently directed, continuous
development of prenatal life. (pp. Q75-83)
Grisez does not attempt a positive metaphysical demonstration that
every living individual human is a person. He is fully aware that in a
pluralistic society no such thesis will achieve sufficiently general acceptance
as to form a basis for practical policy. Rather, he first shows that suggested narrower determinations of personhood are inadequate when critically examined. For example, many prefer to take the adult as the
paradigm for personhood and declare that personhood is present only
when there is a developed capacity for reasoning, desiring, relating to
others, and the like. But the intolerable consequences of this view are not
honestly faced by its proponents. Such a view must classify born infants
as non-persons also; and it tends very strongly to deny personhood to
all those who in various ways lose significant possession of such capacities.
Attempts to formulate a credible notion of personhood tailored to exclude
unborn infants but include all other humans have not proved successful.
Then Grisez points out that the peculiar status of the concept of person
forbids us to rule away the possible rights of candidates for personhood
by the arbitrary decision to count only some humans as persons. It
would be interesting to compare Grisez's argument (pp. 277-87) with the
one R. M. Hare uses in the final chapter of Freedom and Reason agaimt
racism. Hare argues that a universal prescription is implied in every
moral judgment. To test the presence of this formal requirement an
imaginative experiment is sometimes helpful. For example, one who
that some human individuals (as Jews or Negroes) do not count as
persons or deserve full human rights must envisage himself in the role of

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BOOK REVIEWS

one of those whose contested rights would be disregarded if the judgment
in question were applied. If he cannot honestly prescribe that others
should then treat him as a non-person, as one without rights, he does not
in fact hold his original principle as a moral one. Similarly, Grisez argues
that we must take the point of view of the fetus and judge that the
fetus would opt for personhood and the right to live. Certainly, he adds,
no apodictic argument can be advanced to show that the fetus is not
a person. In view of this (while we may have a right to hold any metaphysical theories we choose} we must in ethics treat the fetus as a
person. For " to be willing to kill what for all we know could be a
person is to be willing to kill it if it is a person." (p. 306) A certain
terrible pattern has been followed many times in history. Those humans
whose lives, property, or freedom have been the object of exploitation were
first declared non-persons by the definitions of other men: Indians, Jews
Negroes, infants that were to be exposed. Those who find it socially
convenient and profitable to kill unborn children for the sake of other
men are not clear heirs of a liberal tradition.
Admission of the personhood of the fetus does not prejudge the question
of whether circumstances sometimes make it justifiable to perform acts
that deprive them of life. Certain kinds of killing in self-defense or
war, for example, have commonly been considered legitimate. But in
facing this issue Grisez expresses the need to have a set of consistent moral
principles concerning human life. Catholic moralists have often been
accused of failing to express the same concern for the sanctity of human
life when capital punishment or war are concerned as when abortion is
being considered. Working carefully out of his basic philosophy of practical
principles, and using a revised principle of double effect, Grisez seeks to
spell out a fully consistent moral approach to the taking of human life
(in a recent article he has developed this attempt more fully: "Toward
a Consistent Natural-Law Ethics of Killing," American Journal of Jurisprudence Vol. 15, 1970, pp. 64-96). While consistency here is certainly
essential, the very sketchy treatment of extremely complex issues like
those of capital punishment and nuclear deterrence do not add strength
to the book. For abortion and every other kind of killing, Grisez argues
that only an indirect taking of human life can be morally justified. But
he argues that operations considered instances of direct killing by most
Catholic moralists (such as craniotomies} are really indirect.
A modification of the double effect theory, based on reflections on
Thomas's classic treatment of self-defense (Summa Theol., II-II, q. 64,
a. 7) , is invoked to defend this contention. Grisez objects to the traditional
requirement that "the evil effect must not (even physically} be the means
to the good effect." Thomas, Grisez asserts, " does not make an issue of
which effect (aspect of the act} is prior in physical causality." (p. 333)

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317

In fact, Grisez sees the act of self-defense as often achieving its end only
(physically) through the bad effect: it may be only the killing of the attacker that secures the defense. But that is not important. What is essential
is that the human act itself should initiate an indivisible process leading
to the good effect and that the agent intend only the good effect. The
craniotomy, for example, immediately relieves a pressure tending to
destroy the mother's life and immediately begins a process of healing;
it also causes death. Because the action with equal immediacy initiates a
healing process and causes death, one intending only the healing may
rightly say that the healing is indirect, Grisez holds.
On the one hand, many advantages can be realized from this reform
of the principle of double effect. The sharpest objections to a morality
upholding any absolute principles and utilizing the principle of double
effect have been largely based on an intuitive conviction that certain
apparently necessary consequences of such a view are plainly wrong: that,
for example, a mother must die, and perhaps die with her child, rather
than have a craniotomy. (Cfr. J. Bennett, "Whatever the Consequences,"
Analysis, Jan. 1966, pp. 83-102.) Grisez escapes this difficulty. Moreover,
his modifications do not labor under the same drastic defeats that he
sharply criticises in the work of Peter Knauer, S. J., William van der
Marek, 0. P., and Cornelius van der Poel. (pp. 329-33)
But these advantages are perhaps bought at too high a cost. The old
danger of justifying the doing of evil that good may come of it may
lurk here, in spite of the author's attempt to avoid it. I fear that many
more killings than those Grisez wishes to accomodate, and many other
kinds of acts commonly held intrinsically immoral among Catholic moralists, may gain support from his revised principle. Abortions that simply
promote a mother's health, physical or mental, and abortions in the
case of rape, can be counted indirect according to this revised principle.
Grisez indeed argues that these other indirect abortions would be immoral,
because in his view it would never be reasonable to try to preserve one's
own or another's health by an act that would cause someone's death.
But that is far from evident. Were it true, a man would be morally
obliged to endure a criminal beating from a criminal assailant if he could
ward off the harm only by an act that has unintended deadly consequences.
The error in Grisez's position, if it is an error, arises out of neglecting an
important factor in the self-defense example of St. Thomas. There it
was not a question of performing any action whatever that simply happens
to save one life and destroy another. It was precisely a matter of warding
off an unjust assault. Certainly it is true that the same overt behavior
might serve as a vehicle for different intentions and so serve as the physical
basis of morally different kinds of acts (as burning a wound might be either
cauterizing or torturing) . But it is not " physicalism " in any bad sense

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to say that different real contexts have major moral significance and
that a proper directing of the intention is not sufficient for absolving the
agent from direct responsibility for evils effected in all cases.
Thus, one who cauterizes a wound knows he is causing pain but knows
also that he is not torturing. But one who performs a craniotomy knows
that he is in fact killing an innocent person. And he wants to do this;
not indeed as an end, but so that through this he may achieve a great
good. The whole nature of an evil act remains immanent in the broader
act of initiating a saving process. It is unlike the case of self-defense,
where the killing of the assailant is not a necessary means, a stage on
the way to the end. That killing in self-defense, if it is justifiable, is
simply a consequence of an act of preventing an unjustified assault. But
the killing in a craniotomy is deliberately done as an understood part
of the saving process. Moralists certainly ought to examine Grisez's
arguments here with great care. It is indeed true that the procedures in
question are in fact virtually never required to save a mother's life; but
the principle involved is of the greatest importance.
The final chapter, "Toward a Sound Social Policy," begins with a
balanced treatment of the complex current debate of the relations between
law and morality, largely growing out of the Devlin-Hart controversy.
There follows an excellent series of studies on legal developments touching
the rights of fetuses concerning property, the law of torts, and criminal law.
In every instance a parallel tendency is seen. As scientific evidence for
the humanity of the unborn from conception grows, recognition of their
human rights in law begins to grow. Only when the special pragmatic
interest of those favoring abortion becomes stronger does this liberal trend
suffer.
Law suffers from many inconsistencies at present. Grisez highlights
some of the intolerable consequences of counting the unborn as persons
in some relationships but not in others. He realizes that law certainly
need not define everything in a single way for all purposes. But when
judgment on a plausible claim for full personal dignity is at stake, a
clear and consistent position is essential. Grisez argues that " correct
public policy for a pluralistic society is to accept the more comprehensive
rather than an exclusive view." (pp. 418-19) A more comprehensive
view, recognizing the legal rights of every living human, does not deny
anyone's right to his own metaphysical or religious opinion. But it
does give to each plausible claimant of personhood an equal hearing,
and a recognition that could be denied only on the basis of restrictive
dogmas devoid of real factual basis. It is noted that the Supreme Court
in a recent quasi-definition of person (in Levy vs. Louisiana, 1968) proposed criteria fully satisfied by the unborn from the time of their conception: that they are persons who are " humans, live, and have their

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319

being." The chapter concludes with a practical " Strategy in Defense of
Life," for the use of those deeply concerned to act in defense of the
rights of the most defenseless of humans. An epiloque discusses the nature
and the deep roots of what should properly be called a prejudice of many
against the unborn, a prejudice as dehumanizing as that of racism.
This review can only suggest the wealth of information and the richness
of the analysis in Grisez's study. This book would certainly be a precious
tool for any class in contemporary moral questions. It honestly faces all
the terrible complexity of live moral debate and manages to escape a
question-begging commitment on one side and scepticism or relativism
on the other. No one seriously interested in the abortion controversy
can afford to neglect this outstanding work.
RoNALD D. LAWLER, 0. F. M. Cap.
The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

The Philosophy of the Church Fathers. Volume I. Faith, Trinity, !nearnation. By HARRY AusTRIN WoLFSON. Third Edition, Revised. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970. Pp. 663. $12.50.
The present controversy about the value of dogmatic formulas and the
modern form to be given to the depositum fidei, to make it meaningful
for today, has again raised the question of the "Hellenization of Christianity." Anyone interested in this problem should read Professor Harry
A. Wolfson's book on Faith, Trinity and Incarnation which was published
first in 1956 and has become a classic in the field. The recasting of
Christian beliefs in the form of a philosophy and the producing of a
Christian version of Greek philosophy is one of the most interesting subjects in the history of theology. While the work is primarily a study of
the Church Fathers, chapters on the New Testament appear as background.
Part One provides an investigation of St. Paul's allegorical interpretation
as related to that of the Fathers. The faith theories of Clement of
Alexandria, Origen, Tertullian, and Augustine are given an excellent
analysis. Part Two traces the origin of the Trinitarian formula and the
differentiation of the Logos and the Holy Spirit ending with a study
of the Logos and Platonic ideas. Part Three deals with three mysteries
of the faith, the mystery of the generation, the mystery of the Trinity
with the solutions proposed by Origen, Tertullian, Basil, Augustine,
and John of Damascus, and the mystery of the Incarnation. Part Four
presents an analysis of Gnosticism as an attempt to Christianize pagan

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BOOK REVIEWS

philosophy. The discovery of the papyri of Nag Hammadi has shed an
entirely new light on this development.
Wolfson's book, here in its third and revised edition, forms volume
I of the Philosophy of the Church Fathers. It is to be hoped that the
other volumes will soon follow. Even if one does not agree with all of
the author's conclusions, his book remains one of the most challenging
of our times.
JoHANNES

QUASTEN

The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

Readings in Ancient Western Philosophy. Edited by GEORGE F. McLEAN,
0. M. I. and PATRICK J. AsPELL, 0. M. I. New York: Appleton Century Crofts, 1970. Pp.
$3.50.
The traditional introductory course in ancient philosophy threatens
to become a true " dark night " for those who lecture undergraduates
as we move into the tempestuous nineteen-seventies. Although some
teachers will devise gimmicks-are Heidegger and Hesse, after all, so
far removed from Hesiod and Heraclitus?-it will be difficult to do so
without brooding over the fact that content has been sacrified for contemporaneity.
The present anthology probably does as much as can be done to present
one segment of our intellectual history for the college audience without
attaching itself to a scheme which might attract attention at the expense
of allowing the development of thought in the West to manifest itself.
McLean and Aspell take us from the myth-like origins of philosophy to
the " standard " pre-Socratics, and then through Plato, Aristotle, and
the ethical philosophies of the so-called Hellenistic-Roman period, concluding with a substantial portion of Plotinus. This latter is especially
welcome, since the mystical disciple of Ammonias Saccas has tended to
get lost in the " intertestamental " period of Western philosophy. Besides,
if gimmicks are to be shunned, the Enneads have considerable possibility
for making ancient thought vivid for a generation increasingly taken up
with transcendental thought and spiritualism.
The editors have contoured their selections into three parts marking
the origin and growth of Greek philosophy, its maturation, and the
shift from metaphysical speculation to ethical concerns under the practical
Roman influence. Almost half the volume, Chapters 7 and 8, are devoted
to Plato and Aristotle. This procedure is defended by the editors in
such wise: "The acid test of time has unveiled Aristotle's philosophy,

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321

along with that of Plato, as. . . the two major statements of classical
Greek thought." (p. 173) This observation is typical of the introductory
material found thoughout the work; it is mainly factual and generalizations
are so broad as to offend no one who would harbor a private thesis as
to the relative significance of the ancients.
The Chapters are followed by series of study questions and a " Thematic
Table " enhances the volume's value for college level courses. This latter
is a valuable aid in relating the historical aspect of philosophy to the
main divisions, as traditionally conceived, of the subject. The themes
parcel out the texts found in the anthology under eight headings such
as epistemology, psychology and theodicy; it would be a useful classroom
task to run both historical and theme approaches, and in this case, at
least, it would be feasible. The ten chapters are firmed up with extensive
bibliography, quite up-to-date, although one would like to see included
some of the more adventuresome interpretations of ancient thought,
such as F. Clive's two-volume " The Giants of Pre-Sophistic Greek
Philosophy " (Nijhoff, 1965) .
JoHN B. DAvis, 0. P.
The Pennsylvania State University
University Park, Penna.

A History of Western Philosophy: Volume II, Philosophy from St.
Augustine to Ockham. By RALPH M. MciNERNY. Notre Dame:
University of Notre Dame Press, 1970. Pp. 401.
To my knowledge this volume represents the latest effort of its kind
in the field of Medieval philosophy; it also marks the second volume in
a new series devoted to the history of Western philosophy. R. Caponigri
and R. Mcinerny have joined efforts in producing a set of textbooks
purposely aimed at promoting " the return of the history of philosophy
to its rightful place of honor and usefulness in the academic program."
(xiii) The fourth volume, Philosophy from the Romantic Age to the
Age of Analysis, has not appeared. When it does, the series will compete
with that edited under the general direction of E. Gilson (although one
volume of that series is, I believe, lacking) . A. Maurer authored the
Medieval volume of the Toronto set; it is presently almost ten years old.
Certainly a singular feature of Mcinerny's work is that it is not written
on the Toronto bias. The author is not in sympathy with the Christian
philosophy thesis of E. Gilson. In fact, he implies that the entire raison
d'etre of his work is to provide a history of Medieval philosophy which
is willing to acknowledge in that period an independent and autonomous

BOOK REVIEWS

philosophy. " If that phrase [Christian philosophy] accurately described
the philosophical contribution of the Middle Ages, we would see little point
in writing this present book." (p. 8)
Mcinerny's text is suitably done. He discusses everyone who should
be discussed, although not everything; e. g., shortshrift is made of the
Condemnation of 1Q77 and so-called "Latin Averroism." Also I do find
it a mark of disproportion that the author devotes only one paragraph(!)
to Jewish thought in the Middle Ages while a whole chapter is devoted
to " other ninth and tenth century figures " such as Heiric and Remigius
of Auxerre and Gerbert of Aurillac. His style is clear but very academic:
at times it languishes under the burden of the material. One questions
the need for a " sustained look " of nine pages at Gundissalinus's De
divisione philosophiae in a college textbook. While there is ample reference
to the primary sources, the bibliographies placed at the end of each section
are slim. The volume certainly does not qualify as a reference tool in the
way that Gilson's classic, A History of Christian Philosophy in the Middle
Ages, does.
In brief, the college teacher who wishes to have everything " right
there " will find Mcinerny's work a handy instrument and certainly
adequate for that purpose. The authors, however, plainly advise instructors
to avoid "teaching this book" (xiv) but rather to use it as a guide
for creatively planning a course. An alternative program I personally have
found more successful for planning a college course in this area is the
choice of any number of high quality paperbacks, many of which contain
editions of primary sources with brief introductions. The truly creative
teacher can present his students three or four more specialized volumes
which cover the same material and afford a refreshing change of style,
attitude, and approach to the field of Medieval philosophy.
RoMANus CESsARIO, 0. P.
Dominican House of Studies

Washington, D. C.

Contemporary German Philosophy and Its Background. By FRITZ-JOACHIM
voN RrNTELEN. Bonn: Bouvier, 1970. Pp. 187. DM Q6.
This survey of the German philosophical scene belongs in the respected
tradition of the earlier accounts by Werner Brock and I. M. Bochenski.
The author does not dig into the individual thinkers as deeply as did
Brock and does not share Bochenski's concern for other European traditions. But brevity combines with sureness of touch to give a special

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quality to Rintelen's book as a useful first introduction for college students.
The careful organization of chapters and clear exposition of doctrines
testify to Rintelen's long experience as teacher and author, as well as
his firsthand acquaintance with American universities and the needs of
students. The book is a revised version of lectures delivered originally
at the University of Southern California.
The term " background " appearing in the title enables Rintelen to
enlarge his scope to include the entire twentieth century. This gives
valuable depth to the perspectives taken on each school so that some of
its presuppositions can come into view. For instance, the reader will
be able to find here some specific content for the much-used, yet vague
term "Neo-Kantianism,"
which figures so prominently in discussions
of the development of Husserl and Heidegger. Together with a general
characterization, the book probes into the main men and philosophical
issues distinguishing the Marburg and Heidelberg schools. The stress
upon background also permits Rintelen to recall the work done by Dilthey
in the field of historical understanding of cultural realities, as well as the
contributions of Brentano to the phenomenological movement.
The five main currents presented here are: philosophy of logos, lifephilosophy, essence-phenomenology, philosophy of existence, and philosophy
of the living spirit. The first division is a rather uneasy unification of the
Neo-Kantians and the logical positivists, taken together in virtue of their
common interest in the formal analysis of science. But the Kantians tend
to develop ethics and the human sciences, while the positivists move on
to a new career in America as more pragmatic thinkers. Life-philosophy
arouses interest mainly through Driesch, Spengler, and the inclusion here
of Gestalt psychology. We come to the heart of German philosophizing
in present-tense terms only with the last three schools. Rintelen is quite
evenhanded in presenting the several phases of Husserl's phenomenology,
neither contracting it to a logical methodology nor dissolving it in transcendental reductions without end. Having done good interpretative work
previously on Heidegger and Jaspers, the author is specially lively in
presenting them within their own atmosphere of problems. He also
adds an interesting account of F. 0. Bollnow's efforts to move beyond
the classical German existentialists.
Rintelen comes into his own territory in treating the philosophy of
living spirit. Having criticized the existentialists (in a separate section)
for not working out the relation between concrete uniqueness and the
more comprehensive aspects of being and moral obligation to the world
community, he seeks a synthesis of the existential and the phenomenological. " Hence there has come forth in Germany another direction of
thought which could be called the philosophy of lebendiger Geist, of the
'living Spirit,' which endeavors to bring the existential and phenomenolog-

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ical extremes together in a higher unity." The book culminates with an
analysis of this unifying school, represented by Spranger and Litt, Leo
Gabriel and Max MUller, Nicolai Hartman and Rintelen himself. The
latter holds " that the order of values reveals a dynamic, vertical ' upward '
axis-of-meaning (Sinnachse) in which, however, the horizontal value form
which is valid in this actuation should not be lost sight of." More of his
realistic analysis of values can be found in Rintelen's article in International Philosophical Quarterly (vol. 4, 1964).
This is a well-informed, communicative, and generous-spirited invitation
to the study of present forms of German philosophy. With its help,
one can gain an initial orientation and can also appreciate why the
questions of meaning, being, and human cultural unification are so central.
With his brief mention of Ernst Bloch and Viktor Frankl, Rintelen
leaves us with an opening toward other tendencies as well.
JAMES CoLLINS

Saint Louis University
Saint Louis, Missouri

The French Institutionalists: Maurice Hauriou, Georges Renard, Joseph
T. Delos. Edited by ALBERT BRODERICK. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 1970. Pp. 395. $15.00.
The procedural framework of the legal system occupies a central
position in recent studies of contemporary jurisprudence and the comparative philosophy of law. The processes of law, as Paul Freund recently
remarked, rather than its particular judgments or results, offer insights
which "may teach us to cope with the great antinomies of our aspirations:
liberty and order; privacy and knowledge; stability and change; security
and responsibility." 1
The legal enterprise, defined in Henry M. Hart's studies around the
principle of institutionalized decision and settlement, is a creative force
in society. Law serves persons in radical interdependence by procedures
to duly direct and domesticate power. The legal order is a positive context
for the developing interrelationships of rights and duties between individuals and organizations within the national state and the international
community.
Focusing upon the centrality of a progressive and societal role of law
jurists are increasingly turning from treatises preoccupied with systematic
1

On Law and Justice (Cambridge:

The Belknap Press, 1969), p. v.

BOOK REVIEWS

825

conceptualization and codification to a methodology of interdisciplinary
analysis. Illustrative of this trend are the recent studies of Freund, Lon
L. Fuller's The Anatomy of Law, and two very significant studies of the
judicial process, Alexander Bickel's The Supreme Court and the Idea of
Justice and Schubert and Danelski's Comparative Judicial Behavior: CrossCultural Studies of Political Decision-Making in the East and West.
The present collection of essays taken from the writings of Maurice
Hauriou, Georges Renard and Joseph T. Delos brings welcome light upon
the American scene. Careful editing and meticulous annotation make
this volume a valuable contribution to the analytic endeavor. An equally
worthy translation serves to convey with clarity and precision the thinking
of the great French jurists as they explored the dynamics of social
interaction to establish law and right upon the institutional foundations
of society.
Roscoe Pound classified the work of Maurice Hauriou, Dean of the
Faculte de Droit of Toulouse in the first quarter of the century, as
neo-scholastic sociological jurisprudence. What Kant attributed in the
development of legal obligation to will, Marx to economic wants, Post
to instincts, Weber to values, and William James to desires and demands
in conflict, Pound says Hauriou ascribed to institutions. 2 Pound found
this a dangerous shift of the basic legal unit away from the individual
man. He feared submergence in the demands of the corporate state. Yet
it is now clear that Hauriou compensated by a rich personalism which
enabled him to strike a theoretical balance that Pound had failed to see.
Hauriou sought an explanation for the developing legal order that
would avoid both an individualistic disintegration in the fictionalized
citadel of contract and the denigration of legal personality by the
equation of legal order with the state. For this reason he repeatedly
criticized Leon Duguit, who he thought had used sociological theory in
such a way as to jeopardize the very integrity of personal rights as a
creation of the mass of consciences. This he thought would leave unprotected the rights of any dissident minority. But with equal vigor he
opposed Hans Kelsen's pure theory of law as a formalistic construct
unrelated to the dynamics of the social factor. Both extremes failed to
account for the complexities or the evolution of positive law by reducing
them to a single explanation, a "monism " as he termed it. The individual,
Hauriou believed, is antecedent to both law and state, not in the privity
of a shielded subjectivity but as a social being, as needing for growth
and fulfillment the structure of institutionalized relationships.
Hauriou's studies of French administrative law, of which he is the
acknowledged master, led him to the theory of institution. The integration
• Jumprudrmce (St. Paul: The West Publishing Co., 1959), I, 842.

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of custom, contract, and legislation in a processive and relational matrix
of positive law has been further developed by his two most important
disciples, Georges Renard, formerly professor of public law at Nancy, and
Joseph T. Delos, professor of sociology and law at Lille. These have gone
beyond Hauriou into a general institutional theory or philosophy of law.
Of the three, Delos alone, who contributes a retrospective essay to this
volume, is still alive.
Man in his natural sociability is the basic datum, the principal " social
fact " in a galaxy of interrelated phenomena which supply the concrete
concern for justice in positive law. In the view of the institutionalists,
these social facts tend to coalesce in structured institutions under the
influence of directive ideas. The rational element or guiding idea is the
leading reason for cooperation in the formation of organizations and the
vital, moving force of institutions. Hauriou defined institution basically as:
... an idea of a work or enterprise that is realized and endures juridically in a
social milieu; for the realization of this idea, a power is organized that equips it
with organs; on the other hand, among the members of the social group interested
in the realization of the idea, manifestations of communion occur that are directed
by the organs of the power and regulated by procedures. (p. 99)

The role of authority within any institution is to further the attainment
of this organizing and directive idea. The exercise of authority, however,
depends on the observable stage of ideational development, wherein the
role of sociology is pivotal. Social facts supply the stuff of positive law,
but the directing idea remains normative. Progress in society depends
upon the rational development of basic ideas in the light of critical moral
principles bearing upon the values of order, justice and liberty, and the
need procedurally to balance power with power to compensate for human
weaknesses.
The legal enterprise is thus the art of achieving the idea, the common
personal and social objectives of interdependent men and institutions.
In this sense law is preeminently practical. Hauriou cited favorably
the definition of Celsus that law is an art, ars boni et aequi. Utilizing the
data of the social and behavioral sciences law properly functions to the
attainment of fundamental moral ideas for the common good of society.
These moral ideas can be verified by the observation of the reality of
men living in society.
As Delos remarks, this means preeminently a return to reality, to
an objective natural law based upon the observation of human nature, not
as an abstract notion or concept but as that which is " most real and
most living in each one, the principle of all the instincts, vital forces,
intellectual, moral or physical needs, that give birth to the life of society
and provide it with its ends." (p. 9!65)

BOOK REVIEWS

Social relationships are real. They constitute an "objective reality,
exterior to the individuals who are the support and the terms of these
relationships, and they are irreducible to psychological or interpsychological
Thus, institutions as unlike as the family and the
realities." (p.
organized international society have an incontestable natural foundation
in an observable reality.
An institutional conception of law thus means . . . a conception of juridical
reality that, applied to foundations and groups, brings out the fundamental role
of the directing idea; applied to the study of the legislative act, emphasizes its
nature as an "incarnate idea"; and finally, applied to contract, explains its true
nature, shows that it is not a simple balance between two wills but that it too is
institutional in nature and gravitates around an organizing idea. (p. fl52)

Law is never merely the manifestation of will. Thus, an analysis of
the realities themselves, a study of the internal structure of the juridical
act, definitively casts subjectivism and voluntarism outside the domain
of the philosophy of law.
Right and duty manifest themselves when reason fulfills its proper office and,
considering the beings in question, judges what their reciprocal relationships should
be in order to conform to their nature. Reason then discerns an order of natural
balance, that is, an order of justice that is founded not on arbitrary subjective
evaluations but on the objective value of beings. Law is born when reason is no
longer content with simply verifying the nature of beings but draws normative
consequences from them. The jurist is a sociologist who adds to his preoccupations
a concern for order. (p. fl61)

Positive law, Delos explains, IS the normative expression of the social
order of justice and balance.
The order of justice is then truly a
societal order, and every act of justice performed by an individual realizes
an " element " of the social order.
The institutionalized conception of law is purposeful and dynamic.
It sees positive law as intent upon achieving human group aims in a
process of development.
The juridical rule is neither a deductive
concept nor the arbitrary and subjective decision of a judge. Rule and
social reality are interrelated. Law develops from the society which takes
priority to it and to which it is ultimately subservient. The rule of law
is not a purely formal reality; it is a social form, a social manner of
behavior expressed in positively juridical terms.
This brief outline fails to do justice to the profundity of legal analysis
attained by the French institutional jurists. Time and again the perceptive
insight of these men rises to be captured in application to contemporary
problems of right and order, due process, judicial prospectivity, and
rapidly expanding vistas of domestic and international law. One senses in
agreement with the editor the similarity between Myres McDougal's

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" goal-thinking " and Hauriou, while wondering about the influence of
Fran<;ois Geny, Renard's dean at Nancy, on American jurisprudence
through Benjamin Cardozo's frequent citation of him in the famous
The Nature of the Judicial Process. Beneath the scholastic categories of
Renard and Delos, matter and form, substance and accident, foreign to
the ken of most American jurists, one discovers a concern similar to
Freund's impatience with one-dimensional thinking and his aspiration that
the courts serve as "the conscience of the country." 3
The evolution of legal rights need not only mean the explicitation of
new demands upon society nor even the unfolding of natural law through
progressive applications as " the evolution of human life brings to light
new necessities in human nature that are struggling for expression." 4
As Broderick himself has ably demonstrated, the insight of the French
institutionalists may well transcend the naked individualism of Locke and
also the static conceptualism of latter-day exponents of an objective
natural law. 5 Providing a broader empirical base of observation, it gives
a more convincing legal analysis of the present scene.
The French Institutionalists appears as volume VIII in the Twentieth
Century Legal Philosophy Series published under the auspices of the
Association of American Law Schools. With glossary and comments by
Jean Brethe de la Gressaye, Andre Hauriou, Bernard Geny, and Marcel
W aline, it will stand as an exemplary work of comparative jurisprudence.
WILLIAM

w. BASSETT

The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

The Paradoxical Structure of Existence. By FREDERICK D. WILHELMSEN.
Irving, Texas: The University of Dallas Press, 1970. Pp. 175.
As Jacques Maritain wrote:
A deep vice besets the philosophers of our day, whether they be neo-Kantians,
neo-positivists, idealists, Bergsonians, logisticians, pragmatists, neo-Spinozists, or
neo-mystics. It is the ancient error of the nomitnalists. In different forms, and
with various degrees of awareness, they all blame knowledge-through-concepts for
8 Op. cit., pp. 115 and 96.
• John Courtney Murray, We Hold These Truths (New York: Sheed and Ward,
1960)' p. 818.
• " Evolving Due Process and the French Institutionalists," The Catholic University of America Law Review, 136 (1964), 95-135; "Rights, Rhetoric and Reality:
A New Look at Old Theory," ibid., 19 (1969), 183-157.

BOOK REVIEWS

829

not being a suprasensible intuition of the existing singular . . . They cannot
forgive that knowledge for not opening directly on existence as sensation does, but
only onto essences, possibles. (Degrees of Knowledge, trans. Phelan, p. 1)

Maritain's list could now be considerably enlarged. Regretably, among
those included would be many who are otherwise realists; and not the
least of these would be Frederick D. Wilhelmsen. This book is a wellwritten and learned attempt at a metaphysical synthesis which not only
adresses fundamental theoretical questions but also confronts the contemporary spiritual crisis experienced by the human person. Central to
the way in which Wilhelmsen has articulated the many valid insights
found here, however, is his belief that "we humans simply cannot think
the act of existing, cannot conceive in an idea that without which nothing
would be." (p. 133) And what better reason could be offered for this
belief than the description of conceptual knowledge given by Maritain?
Concepts grasp "essences, possibles." Existence, on the contary, is
" the supreme and perfect act." (p. 50) Rather than being a possible,
existence is the act of all acts, it is that which possibility is the possibility
of. So for existence to be known by a concept would be a paradox of the
highest order.
On the other hand, the main theme of this book is the paradoxical
structure of existence itself. Since it cannot be known by means of
Conconcepts, existence cannot be treated as a logical "something."
sequently it cannot be the subject of affirmation or denial; it neither
is nor is not. Things exist; existence does not. The principle of noncontradiction therefore operates at the level of essence, not existence.
And because existence is neither affirmed nor denied, our metaphysical
knowledge of it is best understood as an ongoing process of reasoning
about existence which never ceases but is always leading to new reasonings.
A paradoxical metaphysics accepts the tensions resulting from existence's
transcendence of the principle of non-contradiction. A dialectical metaphysics of the Hegelian variety tries to resolve the tensions in a higher
unity. Hegelian metaphysics is the natural result of interpreting the act
of existence as the object of a concept. In other words, Wilhelmsen
attempts to deduce Hegel's errors from the fallacy of objectifying being
conceptually. If the act of existing is treated as a " something," it follows
that it must be identified with its conceptual opposite, non-being; the
Hegelian dialectic is thus generated.
From the point of view of the paradoxical structure of existence, Gorl
can be approached differently from the way he is approached in the
ordinary causal proofs. These proofs seek an explanation for existence seen
as in things rather than seen as transcending the order of things and their
natures. If the act of existing is that without which nothing is and if
finite existence itself is not, there must be some act of existing which is.

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The recognition that finite existence is not an m itself " and so cannot
be affirmed implies the recognition that finite existence is something
completely relational to some existence that is an " in itself " and can be
affirmed. For modern man who has experienced the non-identity of essence
with its own existence, the only alternative to the recognition of the
paradoxical structure of existence and the affirmation of God it implies
is the fall back into the nothingness of essence stripped of existence.
And the experience of nothingness implies that existence is taken as a
"something" which can have a contradictory opposite. Furthermore,
personality is a function of existence rather than nature. Not being a
"something," existence is not to be considered identical with itself. It
follows that persons whose essence is distinct from existence have being
only in relation to, and find their identity only in, an existence which
is identical with itself, God.
But if existence's inability to be conceptualizeJ prevents us from
either affirming or denying that existence exists, how are we able to
affirm that pure existence, God, exists? This appears to be one of the
paradoxical tensions that metaphysics must accept rather than attempt
to resolve. " The affirmation of a non-affirmable existence is the affirmation
of Being Itself, God." (p. 102) If Wilhelmsen can accept paradoxes such
as the affirmation of God, however, why not the paradox of a concept of
existence? In fact the proposition that God is and others like it show
that we can know existence by means of a concept. As I have argued in
this journal (July, 1970), paradox in indeed a permanent condition for
metaphysics. There is nothing wrong with Wilhelmsen holding this. What
ir wrong is that he is not sufficiently faithful to his own insight; what
is wrong is that he has conceptualized that insight improperly.
To admit that we can formulate and judge a proposition about a being
that is its own existence is to admit that we can conceive the act of
existing. As Wilhelmsen himself points out, we certainly do not have
a vision of this being Who is existence. And when we formulate and
judge propositions about this being, we are not doing the kind of thing
we do in our external-sense-life which opens onto existence. In fact, how
can we even entertain the question of whether there is a pure existence
unless we are employing a concept of existence? What are concepts after
all but instruments with which we formulate propositions so that we
can then judge truth from falsity thereby knowing reality? (And to say
that propositions are formed by means of such instruments is not to say
that a judgment is a juxaposition of concepts. Cf. pp. 164-5) While we
are entertaining the question of a pure existence, we are not making any
judgment regarding this existence. And though, while considering the
question, we may be in a process of reasoning, reasoning employs judgments, and judgments concepts. Essential to the job that the distinction

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331

between " conceiving " and " judging " performs both in ordinary and in
philosophic language is the function of marking the difference in our
state of mind when we have reached a decision on a question from our
state of mind when we have not reached a decision yet know perfectly
well what the question is about. Suppressing the term " concept " here
would accomplish nothing more than to force us to invent another form
of expression to do exactly the same job.
What now becomes of the theory that, since existence cannot be
conceived, it cannot be the subject or predicate of affirmation or negation?
Even if it were conclusive, the evidence Wilhelmsen presents for this
(pp. 71, 95-96) would apply to only one kind of judgment about
existence, judgments expressing the contingent fact that an existence
exists or does not exist. No evidence he presents indicates in the slightest
degree that we cannot make another kind of assertion concerning existence,
assertions of a kind Wilhelmsen himself makes literally hundreds of times
throughout this book. On page after page existence functions either as
grammatical subject, e. g., "The act of existing encounters its identity,
its 'Is,' in Him," (p. 104) or as grammatical predicate after the copula,
e. g., "that 'plus' or 'excess' which is the act of existing." (p. 117)
And whatever Wilhelmsen may say about existence transcending the
principle of non-contradiction inasmuch as it cannot be conceived, I doubt
very much whether he wants to exempt any of his propositions of this
latter kind from the injunction against being simultaneously true and
false.
If Wilhelmsen does not think he is employing a concept of existence
when he formulates these propositions, what instruments does he think
he is using? Perhaps the book does not contain an answer to this
question; but on one interpretation it does. And except for the fact
that it is consistent with the texts, that interpretation is almost beyond
belief.
Metaphysics advances, not by the progressive expansion of concepts, but by everdeepening insights into the paradox of existence. . . . It follows that the philosopher
penetrates the mystery of being only by fashioning a symbolic structure through
which he can read the paradox of existence. . . .
Ideas in a state of pure abstraction are impersonal, common, the universal property of the race. Therefore ideas are always banal. Judgements, however, always
involve the whole man and are therefore personal. It follows that a penetration of
existence, while rigorously scientific, is eminently personal. Since existence is
neither affirmed nor denied, existence is never a (conceptual) presence to the human
intelligence. It follows that existence can be " grasped " only in and through
sensorial symbols. (pp. 184-5)

In other words, he appears to be doing more than g1vmg sensorial
symbols a role in our knowledge of existence; he seems to be giving them

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a role that replaces the one mistakenly assigned to concepts. And that
amounts to replacing an intellectual grasp of existence with a subintellectual grasp of existence. No wonder metaphysics has always had
such difficulty if all along it has been using the wrong tool, if it has
been using the intelligence when it should have been using the imagination.
Whatever may have been Wilhelmsen's intentions in these texts, the
place he gives to sensory symbols leads him to devote a chapter to
" The Philosopher and the Myth." The interesting comments made
there on the relation between myth, symbol, and philosophy are somewhat.
obscured by his attempt to express that relation in terms of the traditional
doctrine of the phantasm. He claims (p. 163) that, in his usage, " symbol "
means the same thing that " phantasm " usually means. Consequently his
theory of the dependence of philosophy on myth is presented as a valid
development of the doctrine that all knowledge, including metaphysics,
makes use of phantasms. But he goes on to describe these symbols as
instrumental signs. "A symbol is a material action or thing consciously
used to mean." (p. 167, see also 164) And the phantasm is represented
not as the instrument of the agent intellect but as cause of the intelligible
species in the order of specification. So his symbols are a long way from
what is usually understood by " phantasm."
Still Wilhelmsen has a keen sensitivity for the dependence of intellection
on the formation of adequate sense images; his appreciation of McLuhan
is evidence enough for this. And like McLuhan, though going much
further in his own way, Wilhelmsen sees this dependence not simply
in terms of solitary images but in terms of whole patterns of sensory
response and historically conditioned cultural and linguistic symbolic
structures. As a matter of fact, he sees man's historical existence not
merely as providing psychological conditions for philosophizing but as
providing " an ontological experience which enters integrally into the
act of philosophizing." (p. 132) So to fulfill its own nature, philosophy
must include a penetration of man's historical existence.
Against this justification of the philosophy of history, on the other
hand, it can be objected that science is of the necessary and unchanging
whereas actual historical existence is contingent and fleeting. This is why
many have felt that philosophy must deal with the order of the possibles
and not therefore with the actually existing historical order. Conversely,
Wilhelmsen feels that recognizing knowledge of existential act to be the
goal of metaphysics both refutes the view that philosophy deals with
being as possible and opens the way to philosophical reflection on history
itself. At this point, then, let us take up the problem of possibility
which was mentioned at the outset as a difficulty for the view that
existence can be known by means of a concept.
In the writings of thinkers like Garrigou-Lagrange, Maritain, (and

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333

Phelan) , we find statements to the effect that the propositions of metaphysics bear indifferently on existence as either actual or possible; and
since the possible includes the actual in its extension, it is enough to
say that metaphysics is about existence as possible. So the phrase " about
existence as possible " is intended as a description of a proposition, say
(p); and it is intended to be used in epistemological sentences of the
form "(p) is about existence as possible." Now our problem can be
illustrated by substituting for (p) true metaphysical propositions about
existence which seem to render it impossible for the science of existence
to be a science about a possible. Such propositions could be that existence
is what is most actual in anything, or that nothing can be in act unless
it has existence, or that if existence could be a possible, nothing could
ever be in act for nothing could actualize existence itself, etc. But the
simplest form of such a proposition would be that actual existence is in
no respect a mere possible.
Now this proposition, the proposition that actual existence is in no
respect a mere possible, in its full and unadulterated truth is a perfect
example of a proposition about existence as possible. It, and the other
truths that were mentioned or could have been mentioned, could function
as a paradigm case of what has been meant when the statements of
metaphysics have been described as being about existence as possible.
Substituting for (p) we get "'Existence is in no respect a mere possible'
is a proposition about existence as possible." How can this be? The latter
"possible " does not refer to the object of metaphysical knowledge taken
in its extra-mental state, the state which is known in and by means of
metaphysical propositions such as we are considering. Rather it refers to
the object of metaphysical knowledge taken in its state as object of
the mind. And the phrase " about existence as possible " makes an
epistemological reference to our knowledge of what is true of existence extra-mentally; it does not refer to what is true (and known to
be true) of existence extra-mentally. This point has been so often misunderstood, I will try putting it one more way. "Possible" does not
refer to what metaphysics knows about existence in its extra-mental state;
it refers to existence in its state as object of metaphysics, that is, the
state belonging to it as a result of being known as it is in its extra-mental
state.
In general, though something may acquire characteristics in its being
apprehended by the mind which differ from those belonging to it outside the mind, this does not deprive us of an accurate apprehension of
the characteristics belonging to the thing outside the mind. In the case
of anything which is extra-mental prior to its being made an object, unless
we had knowledge of what is true of it extra-mentally, it would not
have acquired different features within knowledge; for it would not be

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known. So the acquisition of characteristics in knowledge (in order for
the thing to be known) differing from those possessed outside of knowledge
does not imply any difference between what is true of the thing outside
the mind and that which is known about the thing. To say that
existence in its state as object of metaphysical knowledge is possible
existence, therefore, does not deny that what such knowledge knows
about existence is that in itself it is fully actual, the exact opposite of
mere possibility.
But what is there about metaphysical knowledge which allows us to
describe the status of existence not in itself nor in regard to what is
known about it by metaphysics but in regard to the condition it acquires
within intellectual apprehension in order to be so known, as that of a
possible? Knowing a truth such as " Existence is what is most actual in
anything " involves knowing that if something new should come into
existence tomorrow, its existence will be act relative to anything else found
in it. It also involves knowing that if something existed in the past, its
existence was that without which there would have been no other actuality
in it. We are inquiring about what characterizes the act of all acts insofar
as it acquires the state of being present in metaphysical apprehension.
Metaphysics yields categorical judgments, no doubt. But the same metaphysical apprehension of existence also gives us knowledge of the necessary
truth of hypothetical propositions, propositions true with reference to the
existence of things that no longer exist or that do not exist as yet. In
other words, metaphysics deals with existence in such a way as to give
us knowledge of propositions true of either actual or possible existence,
" possible " being the more inclusive term.
If the propositions of metaphysics were not necessarily true, then it
could be that tomorrow the act of existing would cease being the act of
all acts, that yesterday essences were not distinct from their existences,
that they will cease being distinct from their existences next Tuesday,
etc. It must be emphasized here that the existence apprehended in
necessarily true hypothetical propositions is exactly the same as that
completely non-hypothetical act which holds all things outside nothingness
and which is apprehended in contingent categorical propositions such as
"A plot to kidnap Henry Kissinger exists." The same existence is known
in these two cases; the only difference comes in the manner in which it
is known. And the manner in which existence is known is what the phrase
" possible existence " is all about. One and the same existence can be
known as the actuality of some contingent occurrence or it can be
known as a subject which has a necessary connection with a certain
predicate. Any difference between the existence known in the first instance
and the existence known in the second lies entirely on the side of
the status this identical object has qua object. In metaphysics existence

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335

is made our object in such a way that we are able to know truths about
it so necessary and so unchanging as to even apply to those acts of
existence which have actualized beings in the past or will do so in the
future. The fact that existence is made an object in this way is described
by saying that the condition it acquires in apprehension in order for it
to be so known is that of a possible.
If one does not grant the validity of the kind of distinction made
here, it is difficult to see how he can handle analogous problems in other
areas of philosophy. For example, we know what exists individually by
means of universal concepts. What acquires the relation of universality
in apprehension is (by the very definition of universality) exactly the same
as what exists outside the mind individually. Likewise, that which exists
in metaphysical apprehension as possible is necessarily some form of act,
even that act which is the opposite of possibility. And notice that the
concept individual is a universal concept. That fact does not prevent
it from being an instrument for thoroughly accurate knowledge of individuals and of individuality.
Likewise, we often know positive modes of reality by means of negative
concepts, the non-existence of modes of reality by means of positive concepts, simpler realities by more complex concepts; we know beings which
are not the proper objects of our intellect by means appropriate to our
proper objects, etc. In all such cases the fact that characteristics associated
with our thinking conflict with those characteristics thought of does not
prevent our thoughts from being accurate. The most important case is
that of our knowledge of God. What is signified by concepts such as
good and goodness can be predicated of God even though he transcends
the manners, concrete and abstract respectively, in which these concepts
signify their objects. Because of the distinction between what is signified
and the mode of signification, we do not have to " abandon, suppress
radically, the very conceptual structure of our own mind" (p. 39) when
dealing with God. A fortiori we do not have to do this when dealing
with the act of all acts even though it is signified in the manner of a
possible.
The necessity for making distinctions between what is true of object:,;
qua objects and what is true of them extra-mentally is the reason
a genuine realism must be a critical realism: it must be critical for tlw
sake of the realism itself. If, for instance, this kind of distinction cannot
be made in the case of existence. it should follow that we cannot have
any knowledge of existence at all: for the conflict between what
pxtra-mentally trne of it and what would have to be true of it if it were
to acquire an intra-mental state would prevent it from ever becoming
known. And. at certain places, Wilhelmsen can be interpreted as drawing·
that conclusion. (See pp. 41 and
for example.) Such n

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conclusion would, of course, reduce to absurdity the premise that
philosophy is not about existence as possible. But it may be the most
significant merit of this book that it exposes-by unflinchingly excepting
them-the logical conclusions of doctrines such as the non-conceptualizablc
character of existence.
Whatever his views on the knowability of existence may be in the last
analysis, Wilhelmsen sees the position I am advancing as banishing the
actual contingent existence of things from the vision of philosophy. (p.
152) But what could this banishing mean? If it means the banishing of
contingent existential propositions such as "There is a bone in my soup,"
why not? Metaphysics in not supposed to supply us with knowledge of
that kind of proposition about actual contingent existence. Rather it
is supposed to teach us necessary truths about contingent existence,
necessary truths concerning the same existence grasped in such contingent
propositions. That is what it means for contingent existence to fall under
the vision of philosophy. (Here it should be noted that assertions to the
effect that actual existence is known not by concepts but by judgments
are true when " knowledge of actual existence " refers to knowledge of
the actual exercise of existence on the part of some contingent being.)
Does Wilhelmsen think that the truths of metaphysics are necessary
or that they are contingent? Your guess is as good as mine. In one place
he tells us that the intelligibility seen by metaphysics is "understood
apodictically and as therefore universally valid for all men and for all
time." (p. 136) But later he tells us that in metaphysics we "pass
beyond " the necessary-contingent distinction, that it " loses its relevance."
(pp. 152-154) After all, for a system in which the principle of non-contradiction is transcended, the opposition between being able to be otherwise
and not being able to be otherwise should not be an irreconcilable one.
If the distinction between that which is known about our objects extramentally considered and the conditions they acquire in the process of
becoming known saves our knowledge of necessary truths concerning
existence, does it accomplish this at the expense of the historical nature
of human understanding? On the contrary, the fact that such a distinction.
in the various forms it takes with reference to human understanding,
must be made is the historical nature of our understanding. Of course,
there must always be a distinction drawn between what is known and the
relation of reason being known or being an object which thereby accrues
to it. But only an essentially incarnated and historical intellect, one
whose proper objects are the structurally complex natures of changing
sensible things, knows its proper objects by withdrawing from actual
existence, since it must abstract them from matter and therefore must
signify existence itself in the same manner.
If one holds that the necessary is the object of philosophical inquiry,

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does he exclude history as a field for philosophic reflection and interpretation? Wilhelmsen thinks that he must. But does the fact that mathematics deals with the necessary prevent it from being that which provides
the illumination of the contingent situations in which engineers find themselves? Is a physician's knowledge of biology an obstacle to his discovering
the medical significance of his patient's condition? As a matter of fact,
if we want a good example of how a grasp of necessary metaphysical
truths can serve us very well in an attempt to understand the meaning
of the historical situation in which we find ourselves, we need look no
further than this book. It has a lucid discussion of the contemporary
experience of nothingness as deriving from the rationalistic focus on essence
to the exclusion of existence. And Wilhelmsen criticizes thinkers such
as Teilhard and Cox deftly, showing how the immanentization of human
destiny reduces the person to a servant of temporal progress and how
contemporary secularism has nihilism as its consequence. He describes
such post-Hegelian gnosticisms as " reactionary futurisms,"
(p. 123)
reactionary because deterministic and therefore implying that the future
has already been settled by what is past.
This book definitely gives the lie to those who dogmatically assume
that philosophers whose tradition is that of classical realistic metaphysics
must not be addressing today's problems. But as I said at the beginning,
Wilhelmsen's many valid insights suffer from the articulation (i. e., conceptualization) imposed on them by his denial of the concept as an
instrument for knowledge these insights.
JoHN C. CAHALAN
Merrimac College
North Andover, Mass.

Discovery in the Physical Sciences. By RICHARD J. BLACKWELL. Notre
Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Press, 1969. Pp. 255. $8.50.
Where is science? Since "science " has at least two widely different
meanings, it may be found in at least two locations: libraries and laboratories. The former contain the completed and polished publications
which are the product of science; the latter contain the efforts, usually
unproductive but sometimes brilliantly successful, which are the process
of science. One of the most profound achievements of twentieth-century
philosophy has been in working out an understanding of the logical
structure of science as product. But until the beginning of the last
decade few philosophers ventured forth to analyze science as process.
This was not unintentional, for scrutiny of the process of science soon raises

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the question of the nature of discovery. And what Kepler and Kekule said
covertly in the accounts they gave of their greatest discoveries was said
overtly by Sir Karl Popper in his Logic of Scientific Discovery (!): "The
initial stage, the act of conceiving or inventing a theory, seems to me
neither to call for logical analysis nor to be susceptible to it."
Perhaps the late N. R. Hanson's 1958 volume entitled Patterns of Discovery marked a turning point, for since that time many authors have
turned to the difficult question as to whether anything philosophical can
be said about that seemingly mysterious event, scientific discovery.
Thomas Kuhn, Michael Polanyi, and Stephen Toulmin, to name a few,
have in the past decade attempted this task and philosophers have
returned to previously neglected writings of Whewell, Peirce, and others
to find new insights.
Recently Richard J. Blackwell of Saint Louis University has joined these
workers with his Discovery in the Physical Sciences. As he points out
repeatedly, much is at stake here for, if a philosophical analysis of
scientific discovery were produced, it would greatly expand and enrich,
not to say alter, the philosophy of science. But many are the problems,
for the maximum thesis-that there exists a mechanical or automatic
process for getting from data to hypotheses-is rejected by nearly all
contemporary philosophers, whereas the minimal thesis-that history,
psychology, and sociology can bring a measure of rationality to the act
of discovery-leaves nothing to the philosopher.
In the first of his seven chapters Blackwell introduces the problem and
sketches the major positions as well as building a prima facie case for
the existence of a theory of discovery. Chapter II which distinguishes
between various types of discoveries, especially between "discovering
that" and "discovering why," combines with the first and third chapters,
the latter of which compares the logical, psychological, historical, and
epistemological approaches to the question, to set the stage for the
central argument contained in chapters four through six. Herein Blackwell
develops his "adaption theory of discovery." All too briefly this may
be summarized by stating that Blackwell finds that there are " repeated
epistemological patterns in the act of discovery ... " which are intelligible
when understood as produced through the interrelations of mind with
the "dictates of nature." Blackwell carefully points out the differences
between "discovery that" (e. g., a law of nature), which involves such
processes as formulating a problem, "sorting out," "interrelating recognized components," and " integration with other knowledge," and discovering why," which may involve such activities as "idealization," "creative
postulation," and "substitution through analogy." The final chapter
diverges from the central thrust of the book but builds upon it by an
analysis, showing a Whiteheadian influence, of the question of the
ontological status of physical entities.

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339

This work is clearly written and cogently argued; while the frequent
repetitions of material may distract the professional reader, they surely
shorten the book and increase its impact on the beginning student into
whose hands the book may confidently be placed. Blackwell is both an
able and fair guide into the literature of the problem and a somewhat
successful creator in an area where "somewhat successful" is substantial
praise. This reader would have been interested to find among the many
important distinctions in the book some analysis of the difference between
a methodology of discovery and an epistemology of discovery, and he
wonders whether Professor Blackwell would ascribe normative potential
to his description of the process of discovery.
Wherein lie the main sources of progress on the question of the nature
of discovery? One of these is certainly the bringing to bear on the problem
the insights of differing philosophical positions. Another, the potential
fruitfulness of which is shown by the fact that many of the pioneering
authors who have written most creatively concerning creation in science
have also read deeply in the history of science, lies in the gradually
increasing number of historical studies which tell not just of the verification of a new hypothesis but also search for the roots from which and
the process by which it came to be. And lastly, progress will surely he
aided if the many powerful distinctions, acute analyses, and leads for
future research contained in Blackwell's Discovery in the Physical Sciences
are studied and discussed by other humanists of science. The reader of
this cannot leave it without a strong sense of the complexity of the
problem, engendered by Blackwell's cautious approach, as well as a sense
of the importance of this problem, the solution of which may become the
chief task of philosophers of science in the last third of this century.
MICHAEL J. CROWE
University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame, Indiana

Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science. Vols. IV and V: Proceedings
of the Boston Colloquium for the Philosophy of Science, 1966/1968.
Edited by RoBERTS. CoHEN and MARX W. WARTOFSKY. New York:
Humanities Press, 1969. Vol. IV, pp. 545, $20.00; Vol. V, pp. 490,
$16.75. Vol. VI: Ernst Mach, Physicist and Philosopher. Edited by
RoBERT S. CoHEN and RAYMOND J. SEEGER, New York: Humanities
Press, 1970, pp. 303, $11.50.
These three substantial volumes are the latest additions to the Boston
Studies series, bringing to six the volumes now available.

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BOOK REVIEWS

The first title, Volume IV, consists of lectures given at the Boston
Colloquium from 1966 to 1968 and represent a wide range of interests
in contemporary philosophy of science. The topics treated range from
the neurophysiology of perceptual and linguistic behavior, through the
philosophy of mind and of language, the philosophy of history and of
the social sciences, and studies in the fundamental categories and methods
of philosophy, to the interrelationships of the sciences with ethics and
metaphysics. Most of the twenty-two authors represented are philosophers,
although there are essays of philosophical significance by a sociologist, an
anthropologist, a political scientist, and by three neurophysiologists.
Philosophers of science have not sufficiently addressed themselves to
areas of research in the life sciences that would influence analyses of
perceptual and linguistic behavior. The contributions in this volume that
attempt to supply for this defect include the first English translation of
the classic and fundamental work on aphasia of Carl Wernicke (1848-1905),
the guiding spirit of the Breslau School in neurology and psychiatry,
which is accompanied by a lucid and appreciative guide to his work by
Norman Geschwind. The latter author follows this by a detailed analysis,
in the Wernicke tradition, of "Anatomy and the Higher Functions of
the Brain," concluding with some philosophical reflections on the whole
man, the unity of consciousness, the value of introspection, and language
and thought. After this is a stimulating essay by another neurophysiologist,
Robert Efron, entitled " What is Perception? " wherein the author attempts
to show that a precise answer to this " abstract and philosophical question " is necessary to formulate a valid methodology for any study of
the neural mechanisms that underlie perception, and that any attempt
to conduct such a study " prior to an adequate definition or conceptualization of perception is doomed to failure." (p. 171)
The essays on philosophy of mind and language introduce American
readers to the work of two Polish philosophers, Henryk Skolimowski and
Boguslaw Wolniewicz. The first is an expert on the history of technology
and the author of Polish Analytical Philosophy (London: Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1967) ; his paper on "Knowledge, Language and Rationality " is commented on by Stephen Toulmin. Arguing against two
opposed positions, the " semantic concept of knowledge " and the notion
of " personal knowledge," Skolimowski opts for " the primacy of epistemology over linguistics " and attempts to demonstrate " that the so-called
pure linguistic criteria of meaning are loaded with epistemological assumptions, that the criteria of meaning follow from an implicitly assumed
concept of knowledge, [and] that the concept of language presupposes
the concept of knowledge and is determined by it." (p. 174) His arguments depend heavily on the thought of Karl Popper and lmre Lakatos
and are treated somewhat favorably by Toulmin in his critique. Toulmin

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allies himself with Skolimowski's Aristotelianism, while criticizing his
presentation as "weaker than the occasion demands." (p. 199) The paper
of Wolniewicz, professor at the University of Warsaw, is entitled "A
Parallelism Between Wittgensteinian and Aristotelian Ontologies" and
is inspired by a statement of Irving M. Copi to the effect that " Wittgenstein's objects are substantial in the later sense of substrata, and correspond
more closely to Aristotle's prime matter than to his primary substances."
The author expresses an indebtedness to the writings of Gustav
(p.
Bergmann and his school, and he establishes an interesting Aristotelian
interpretation of Wittgenstein which he claims is even more verified in
"the variety of Aristotelianism represented by Thomism." (p.
This
paper is adversely criticized by Henry Ruf, of Boston University, on
the grounds that it proposes a peculiar interpretation of Wittgenstein's
Tractatus, " which stands in conflict with the major themes " of this
work. (p.
Concluding this group of essays is F. J. Crosson's "The
Computer as Gadfly," which reviews the present state of the computer
art in its attempt to duplicate human intelligence and points out some
of the dilemmas that have been encountered in cybernetics, particularly
in the field of simulation, with illustrations drawn from the areas of
handwriting recognition and language translation.
Surprisingly, all of
the essays in this section have a strong Aristotelian cast and represent
work in a direction that runs counter to the empiricist tradition that has
hitherto been dominant.
The papers devoted to the philosophy of the social sciences include those
of Lucien Goldmann on " The Subject of Cultural Creation," Gajo
Petrovic on "Dialectical Materialism and the Philosophy of Praxis,"
Leon J. Goldstein on "Theory in History," and Michael Martin on
" Understanding and Participant Observation in Cultural and Social
Anthropology," to the last of which are appended comments by Judith
B. Agassi and Sidney W. Mintz. Goldstein's paper is a closely reasoned
review of the recent literature in the debate over the " covering law "
concept of historical explanation, wherein he shows quite convincingly that
the methodological preoccupations of the opposed parties are quite diverse,
and he illustrates this with a series of examples ranging from slavery in
North America to the charge of the Light Brigade. Martin's paper is a
philosophical inquiry into the importance and validity of participant
observation as a methodology in anthropology. Basing his study on a
semantic analysis of understanding and empathy, Martin concludes that
" scientific understanding of a community is logically independent of being
understanding toward a community " (p.
and that in the light of
this and similar conclusions participant observation has limited value
as an anthropological technique. Both commentators find much to crit-

icize in this thesis.

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The last group of essays purportedly relate philosophy of science to
ethics and metaphysics. Abraham Edel writes on " Patterns of Use of
Science in Ethics," and there are comments by Ruth Anna Putnam and
John Ladd. The metaphysical contributions are more disparate, including
an article by Putnam herself, ' On Empirical Knowledge," two papers
on causality (William Ruddick on " Causal Connection " and Edward H.
Madden on "Causality and the Notion of Necessity"), and two fairly
general papers, one lengthy by Joseph Agassi on " Unity and Diversity
of Science" and the other a brief exposition by J. 0. Wisdom" On Methods
of Refutation in Metaphysics." Edel argues that moral knowledge does
not differ radically in kind from the sort of knowledge one hopes to gather
in modern science, and thus there is no a priori reason for denying the
relevance of science to ethics; in fact, he seems to be implying that there
are a posteriori reasons for affiming such relevance. Putnam's paper
is an attempt to buttress the sagging foundations of empiricism, wherein
she proposes an improved empiricist theory of knowledge that would
preserve it as a valid philosophy of science against the interpretations
(and seeming attacks) of Carnap and Kuhn. In his comments on
this paper John Compton admits the importance of historical studies
in reshaping contemporary understandings of the philosophy of science,
and he proposes as a defensible position " that philosophy of science
should become philosophy of the history of science." (p. 418) The papers
on causality by Ruddick and Madden are both critical of the Humean
analysis of causal connection; Ruddick, in particular, has some interesting
insights that derive from his consideration, not of such " true causes "
as has been customary with defenders of causality but rather of deceptive
causes and common causal misjudgments, which enable him to work
out a theory of congruity as the source of explanatory power in causal
identifications. Agassi's paper is directed against simplistic views of
the unity of science; it defends a Popperian theory of rationality as
essentially a problem-solving methodology; within modern science, " solutions to problems offer the element of unification, and their criticisms offer
the element of diversification." (p. 463) Wisdom's paper likewise draws
on Popper and attempts to show ways in which philosophers might agree
on what is wrong with outdated systems of philosophy, such as those
of Spinoza, Berkeley, or Kant. (p. 523)
Like Volume IV, Volume V consists of articles based on papers given at
the Boston Colloquium during the years 1966-1968 but differing from the
previous volume in that they are concerned mainly with the logic and
the methods of the natural sciences, including mathematical, physical,
and biological topics. As in most writing on philosophy of science, the
physico-mathematical essays outnumber by far those devoted to biology.
In the latter category, however, there are two very good papers, one by

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843

Milic Capek on "Ernst Mach's Biological Theory of Knowledge " and the
other by June Goodfield on "Theories and Hypotheses in Biology:
Theoretical Entities and Functional Explanation," which is commented
on critically by Ernst Mayr and Joseph Agassi.
In the realm of more formal analysis, as developed by the Carnapian
and Reichenbachian schools, there are several substantial contributions.
Adolf Griinbaum has a 150-page "Reply to Hilary Putnam's ' An Examination of Grlinbaum's Philosophy of Geometry,'" which is an extensive
rebuttal of Putnam's 50-page criticism of Griinbaum's account of physical
geometry and chronometry, which appeared originally in Vol. II of the
Delaware Seminar (New York: 1963, pp. 205-255) and in turn was a criticism of Griinbaum's "Geometry, Chronometry, and Empiricism," which
appeared in Vol. III of the Minnesota Studies (Minneapolis: 1962, pp.
405-526) . Putnam himself contributes a paper entitled " Is Logic
Empirical? " where he argnes that some of the so-called "necessary truths"
of logic may be shown to be false for empirical reasons and therefore
that "logic is, in a certain sense, a natural science." (p. 216) Other
essays in this general category include David Finkelstein's "Matter,
Space and Logic," and Bernard R. Grunstra's " On Distinguishing Types
of Measurement." Articles that are less formal and possess a more metaphysical content are the following: Peter Havas, " Causality Requirements
and the Theory of Relativity," with a comment by John Stachel; Aage
Petersen, " On the Philosophical Significance of the Correspondence Argument " ; R. FUrth, " The Role of Models in Theoretical Physics " ; Mihailo
Markovic, " The Problem of Truth " ; P. Roman, " Symmetry in Physics " ;
and Wolfgang Yourgrau, "Verification or Proof-An Undecided Issue?"
Only one article draws heavily on the history of science, and this is I.
Bernard Cohen's excellent summary of his work, that has extended now
over many years, on "Hypotheses in Newton's Philosophy."
Volume VI represents a departure from the editorial policy of the
Boston Studies in that it includes contributions that were not presented
originally in the Boston Colloquium but rather formed part of a symposium
to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Ernst Mach.
The symposium was arranged for the joint session of the History of
Science Society and the American Association for the Advancement of
Science (Section L) held in Washington, D. C., on December 27, 1966.
The published papers include some that were not presented at this symposium but were added by the editors to round out the coverage of Mach.
All of the essays relate in one way or another to Mach's life, his work, and
his philosophy. Of particular interest to readers of this journal will be
Erwin N. Hiebert's "The Genesis of Mach's Early Views on Atomism,"
Robert S. Cohen's "Ernst Mach: Physics, Perception and the Philosophy
of Science," and Gerald J. Holton's "Mach, Einstein and the Search for

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Reality." Included in appendices are two articles by Philipp Frank on
Mach's philosophy of science, one by Richard von Mises which has
hitherto been unavailable in English, and biographical data and a complete
bibliography of Mach's writings, including those that have appeared in
English translation.
In sum, these three volumes contain a wealth of information on the
current state of the philosophy of science movement. Like most collections
they are uneven in the quality of their thought, in the level of their
presentation, and in the philosophical background and presuppositions of
the authors represented. This is not necessarily a disadvantage, since the
movement has increasingly diversified within the last ten years or so,
and the inputs from many different philosophical and historical traditions
have contributed greatly to its vitality. In the ten years of the Boston
Colloquium's existence, moreover, its discussions have aided considerably
in this broadening of perspective, and Professors Cohen and W artofsky
can only be thanked for their untiring efforts to give all interested parties
a hearing-ranging from voices within Communist countries that could
all too easily go unheard to those of Aristotelians who courageously discuss
contemporary scientific problems in terms of their roots in Greek thought.
This reviewer has only two adverse criticisms, one probably beyond the
control of the editors, viz., the prices of the volumes, and the other
probably within their control, viz., the absence of an index of any type
in Volumes IV and V. Volume VI has a helpful index of names at the
end, and it is to be hoped that at least this minimal reference aid
will be continued in future volumes.
WILLIAM A. wALLACE, 0. P.
The Catholic Univermty of America
Washington, D. C.

The Great Dialogue of Nature and Space. By YvEs SIMON. Edited by
GERARD J. DALcOURT. Albany, N. Y.: Magi Books, 1970. Pp.!W6.
$3.75.
The first word to be said of this book is that it is splendid, from
every point of view. The analyses in all ten chapters are models of
philosophical brilliance combined with didactic simplicity and historical
exactitude. The editor has organized and polished this posthumous publication with a consummate skill; the publisher has produced a volume
that is aesthetically pleasing and of high quality.
In his " Preface " Mr. Dalcourt modestly describes this book as one

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345

" that should be of some value to the general reader and also, in some
instances, to professional philosophers." (p. xiv) I agree with this
description on both counts-except that I cannot imagine what the
instances might have been in which Dalcourt thought the volume might
not be of value to professional philosophers, for every issue touched on
in this book is fundamental in any thorough philosophical reflection on
the world and is treated with a scholarly competence at the service of philosophical genius, the kind of genius that puts one in the pure presence
of philosophy itself.
The book is all the more amazing when one considers that it is composed of no more than the fragments of a volume which Yves Simon
had planned as part of a comprehensive 21-volume Encyclopedia of
Philosophy, to be published by the University of Chicago Press. Hardly
had Professor Simon conceived and laid the groundwork for this monumental Encyclopedia than it was discovered that he was a victim of
cancer that ensured an early death, much too early to afford any hope
of his carrying through the carefully planned and extensive task of the
Encyclopedia.
What response does a man make in the face of discovering that his
lifework shall go uncompleted, cut off by a mindless and unstoppable
perversion of nature itself? Yves Simon's response at least showed the
stature of the man and the dedication of the philosopher who had
written in his early days: " It is in order to know the truth that one
establishes ideas, expresses concepts, constructs, discourses: when that has
been realized, one is immunized against a great many of the false conceptions of the activity of the mind."
This present book, along with the several other posthumous volumes
already published and still to come, is thus the product of a patient piecing
together of notes and articles which, for all their brilliance and power, are
but a shadow of what would have been had Yves Simon lived to
execute himself the full task he had so well prepared. This fact is a
monumental tragedy for the continuance and development of the philosophical tradition, monumental, because that was the scale of Simon's
genius, and tragic, because it should not have been.
What we are left with, at any rate, thanks to the excellent intervention
of Dr. Dalcourt, is yet one of the finest treatises on the philosophy of
nature that is to be found outside the pages of Aristotle's own Physics,
a treatise whose value, l}lOreover, is doubled by the historical fact of
coming at a time when the philosophical study of sensible nature, as
a discipline distinct specifically from experimental science and metaphysics
alike, is as little understood and valued as one could imagine. That we
live in a dark age of the philosophic intelligence no one familiar with
our university departments doubts. Perhaps the reason Yves Simon, like

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his intimate friend, Jacques Maritain, devoted so much study and writing
to the philosophy of nature, was because he perceived so clearly that a
genuine renaissance of philosophy in the culture of modern man depends
in the most crucial way on a re-establishment and vindication of the
rights of the intelligence-not the manipulative intelligence of experiment
but the intuitive intelligence of being as sensibly realized in itself-at the
very base of our grasp of the world. For only by being assured of its
grasp on the truth as well as the behavior of the physical can the mind
then dare to hope and extend its grasp to metaphysical truths. Because
modern philosophy misunderstood its own dependence on nature, it can
blame none besides itself for the general reception now accorded its
metaphysical claims as myths and high-flown speculations devoid of
soundness.
To restore to philosophy, then, what of nature belongs to it, remarks
Simon (p. 17) , "you can see that ... we shall have constantly to carry
out an epistemological reflection on what we are doing. All that promises
to be very difficult, but if we are only half equal to our task it should
also be very interesting."
That is how Simon sets the stage for the main inquiries of his book.
It is impossible to convey the candor and energy with which he pursues
these inquiries. This is not a book with which one quarrels on particular
points. The author is not interested in quarrelling but with sharing and
furthering a pure philosophical inquiry. No better way and no better
work could easily be imagined to overcome the ingrained prejudices of the
professionals against the very idea of a proper philosophy of the same
phenomena scrutinized by experimental science. If enough young students
should happen to assimilate for themselves, and critically, Dr. Simon's
elegant presentation of The Great Dialogue of Nature and Space, it
might not be too much to hope that days of general acceptance of these
by now hoary prejudices might at last be numbered.
It may be that, for all their relative incompleteness, these posthumous
manuscripts may yet come to mark a decisive early step in the philosophical renaissance Yves Simon perceived, with all its surface improbability, as deeply possible-and necessary, if modern culture is not to
lose the balance of its mind, and therewith its soul. All that promises
indeed to be very difficult. But if we are even half equal to the task, it
should also prove very fascinating. And enough is at stake to make
the game worth playing to the end.
JoHN

Institute for Philosophical Research
Chicago, IUinois

N. DEELY

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347

The God of Evil: An Argument from the Existence of the Devil. By
FREDERICK SoNTAG. New York: Harper and Row, 1970. Pp. 183.
$5.95.

The problem of evil and its implications for the existence of God
remains an open question in theology. Attempted solutions take one
of two directions: either they claim that God in his omnipotence freely
chose this world among all possible worlds and that this is not the best
possible world; or they see God from the viewpoint of process philosophy,
as a God somehow perfectible, somehow acting and being acted upon by an
evolving world, unable to make things better than they are at the present
moment. Frederick Sontag in The God of Evil adopts the first and more
traditional viewpoint. However, his principal concern is to show how
God and evil are compatible, portraying God in existentialist fashion as
one who decides among various possibilities against the horizon of NonBeing. Therefore, Non-Being or Evil are somehow within the range
of God. For Sontag, if God and evil are reconcilable, the atheistic
position is disarmed.
Sontag begins his work by pointing out that the concept of God must
account for the existence of factors that argue against him. He wishes
to describe a God that can exist in spite of destructive forces. (The term
"Devil " is applied to the coalescence of the forces of destruction.)
In
fact, God must have intentionally designed atheism and the grounds for
it. (p.
Previous attempts to prove the existence of God have failed. For
example, the five arguments of St. Thomas are oversimplified and do not
give sufficient attention to the disorder in the world. Kierkegaard's God
seems to stand or fall on the strength of Kierkegaard's personal faith;
and Tillich's God being more mystical than metaphysical is unable to
address himself to the evils of the world. Anti-metaphysical, romantic,
and existentialist positions on God seem to lose validity as the times and
circumstances change.
Sontag's thesis focuses on the observation that to question the existence
of a being implies the possibility of its non-being. Man questions the existence of God and therefore there is nothingness in God, otherwise one
would not raise the question. Just as human reality emerges as a particular
being in the midst of Non-Being, so God's reality can only be understood
by passing through nothingness. Man experiences anguish regarding God
since God's being remains always in question. However, for Sontag to
question God's existence really means that God does not create out of
necessity but out of free decision. God's existence is always in question
in the sense that the issue over what he will create and under what
conditions he will do so is forever an open question. (p. 79) If God
created out of necessity man would have an immediate mental link with
God. Sontag declares: "The reasons behind his [God's] action are a

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question to God and therefore his existence in this sense is constantly in
question, since nothing in his nature leads him precisely or unavoidably
to exactly this form of creation rather than that." (p. 80)
It is through God that nothingness comes into the world in the sense
that he must question himself by holding up all the possibles before
himself for consideration. In doing so he puts himself " beyond Being"
and next to nothingness. Since God has a choice among alternatives,
this is not the best possible world. God could have freely chosen :t
better world but decided on this one. He could have caused or speeded
up the relief of human suffering and did not choose to do so. (p. 18)
"He must then, be a God who does not faint at the sight of blood or
lie awake because sufferers scream." (p. 22) Man's only choice is to make
the best of the situation. Here, we see that Sontag by choosing the
traditional viewpoint regarding God and the problem of evil comes up
against its fundamental weakness: if God could have created a better
world, why did he not do so.
However, it is in the midst of evil that Sontag sees an indication
of God's existence. For, in view of the destructive forces in existence,
we must ask what held these forces in check in creation. What power
formed a world in spite of all resistance and holds evil within limits?
In other words, if God did not exist we would be hard-pressed to explain
the problem of good.
God sets our being adrift in a sea of Non-Being and we must decide
for our possibilities. " To be " means to possess a power sufficient to
sustain a concrete mode of being against its passage into Non-Being.
Personality in God is more obvious in a contingent world rather than
a necessary one. For, to actualize things requires a combination of will,
power, and knowledge-all attributes of personality. The personality
of God allows for man's freedom, something an impersonal principle is
unable to do.
The God of Evil makes a contribution in showing that philosophizing
about the nature of God is still a viable study. Sontag accurately portrays
the present state of affairs and where recent philosophy has failed.
However, certain root questions remain unanswered or not even addressed,
granted the limited scope of the book. Sontag not only presupposes God's
existence but speaks of him as complete in himself, freely choosing to
create this world rather than several better ones. The question still
remains, why should not an all g-ood God create the best world possible.
Sontag is critical of concepts of God which are waning in acceptance, but
his God who gratuitously allows extraordinary evil is not too attractive.
Secondly, positing a God who is the source of good among the destructive
forces of evil does not seem to be an exhaustive explanation. Furthermore,
Sontag seems almost Manichean in giving such a primary role to the

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349

forces of evil. However, the most serious objection is directed against
Sontag's thesis itself. Questioning the existence of a creature immediately
involves its being as opposed to not being. One would expect that
questioning God's existence would also leave God's being in jeopardy.
But, for Sontag, God in himself remains untouched. Rather, questioning
his being indicates God's decision to choose this or that possibility in the
face of being. In other words, Sontag has shifted the issue from the
existence of God to a declaration that God is a free creator rather than
creating out of necessity. The fact that God creates freely and that
limited being shares in non-being has already been clearly drawn by
Scholasticism.
In conclusion, Sontag's work will not be successful in convincing
atheists of the viability of God but can only show that there is nothing
contradictory to his existence. Rather, The God of Evil can serve to
quiet the spirits of the believer. However, the problem of evil remains
and Sontag's God chooses to tolerate it when he could have done otherwise.
SEELY BEGGIANI
The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

Was Jesus Married? The Distortion of Sexuality in the Christian Tradition.
By WILLIAM E. PHIPPS. New York: Harper and Row, 1970. Pp. 243.
$5.95.

A critic's first inclination in response to this study might be to deal
with the innumerable objections and observations put forth by the
author. Such an approach would, in fact, demand another monograph.
This book does not deserve such a response. That is not to say, however,
that this book should be allowed to pass without comment.
The extent of the author's survey and research are rather impressive
(sexual attitudes in ancient Judaism, an exegesis of the Gospel texts
that are related to Jesus' teaching on celibacy, the apostolic and Pauline
witness to and teaching concerning marriage, virginity and sexuality, and
the sexual attitudes of second-century Christianity, early Orthodoxy, and
Roman Catholicism) . At first sight, while such an undertaking might
frighten any serious writer, such a study could certainly have added
something of value to Christology and the place of sexuality in Christian
morality and piety. At first sight too, it would appear that the author
had done his research thoroughly. But unfortunately all this work was
for nought, or at best a superfluous exercise. The issue of the investigation

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BOOK REVIEWS

was never m doubt-the subtitle should be moved to the title position
in future printings.
The study of Jesus' teaching about sexual morality and of his own
sexuality are certainly legitimate and even important topics. In addition.
an investigation of the teaching on sexuality in Christian tradition could
be instructive and might help to explain the almost neurotic preoccupation
of Christianity with sexual morality and ultimately help to put this
subject in the perspective that it needs. The areas and goals, then, of
this study are not in question.
The objections to the book arise from the prejudice, pettiness, and lack
of scholarship that mar almost every page. The prejudices and pettiness
(almost unhealthy in their petulance) need not be documented nor do
they deserve to be. But it is the vincible (?) lack of serious and stringent
methodology for which the author must be held accountable.
The exegetical study of relevant Gospel texts gives no indication that
the author is even remotely aware of Redaktionsgeschichte or the aspect
of the Sitz im Leben der Kirche of the Gospels. The credentials of the
author would lead one to hope that he might escape what is almost a
crass fundamentalism (despite the reference to serious exegetical studies).
The exposition of Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 7 ignores the nuances
of the Apostle's language of command, suggestion, and recommendation
(and the work of S. Lyonnet).
The study of the Patristic evidence is vitiated from the beginning
because, for the author, Hellenistic culture and thought have little or no
redeeming features. The Hebraic mentality and tradition would have
preserved balance and purity of vision on the topic of sexuality-Jesus'
and the rest of men's. Justin is the bete noire of the Patristic scenario.
but then any Father is scolded if his teachings do not fit the author's
"hypothesis."
Furthermore, it would seem that even the most amateur reader of
modern psychology is aware of the difference between sexuality anrl
genital sexual expression and the relationship of both to the personality
and maturity of a man. Here, the author's remarks range from the
simplistic to the erroneous.
But the most serious methodological error of this study is the presupposition that Christian theologizing about the marital status of Jesus
(and the resulting possibility of celibacy as one kind of imitation of
him) cannot rest on a fact: Jesus was celibate. The author's evidence that
Jesus was married (from ancient and contemporary Judaism) is not
conclusive. The evidence for his position drawn from the Gospels is
even less so. There remains the possibility that Jesus was not married, and
it is possible that tradition witnesses to that fact. It need not be, as
the author tries to show, that tradition felt a need to justify its own

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351

bias by inventing something that is fictitious. But again the author's
methodology is too limited and preordained to deal with this option.
Finally, the phenomenon of celibacy in its many forms past and present
within the Christian community is a constant irritant for the author. His
criticism of some of the theology on celibacy and its justification in the
Christian lives of men and women is quite valid at times. But his contribution to the present debate is minimal. If those who seriously question
the present discipline of the Church on this point need the support of
this book, they could be in serious intellectual difficulty.
In conclusion, one wonders who the author has in view as the readers
of his work. It seems impossible that he could expect any intelligent
and knowledgeable reader to be satisfied with the feeble and offensive
polemics of his study. And what is the value of appealing to those who
already agree with him about the distortion of Jesus' life and morality
perpetrated by the Church?
The author should be informed that a " celibate" is the author
of this review (the word might be added to the list of pejoratives in
the English language after its usage in this book) ; this may allow him
to dismiss the preceding observations as Pavlovian responses to his conclusions. But I looked forward to more from this book; I am disappointed
that it was much less than it could have been. The topic is too serious
to be handled in the way in which it was in this book.
JAMES P. CLIFTON, c. F. X.
The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

Hervaeus Natalis, 0. P. and the Controversies over the Real Presence and
Transubstantiation. By KENNETH PLoTNIK. Paderbom: Verlag Ferdinand Schoningh, 1970. Pp. 83. DM 9,80.
Once again the name of the Grabmann Institute is associated with
a valuable contribution to the history of theology. This time, in connection
with the Theological Faculty of the University of Munich, the Pontifical
Institute of Medieval Studies in Toronto, and St. John's Abbey in
Collegeville, Minnesota, the spirit of the Grabmann Institute finds
expression in a study of medieval controversies over the Eucharist.
Kenneth Plotnik reviews the positions of Hervaeus Natalis, 0. P. and
his opponents in the questions of the mode of the Real Presence and
Transubstantiation, offering interpretations of important texts and evidence
for possible reconciliations among the adherents of opposing schools of
thought.

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BOOK REVIEWS

Plotnik addresses himself to a segment of the rational effort of medieval
theologians to express the richness of the Christian doctrine of the
Eucharist. Evident in his work are the strange interaction and interdependence of the medieval disciplines which forced commitments to set
formulas and produced contrived philosophical positions ostensibly in
defense of orthodoxy. However remote in time its subject might be
from current Process Theology, this study provides a useful link between
the simplistic presentation of New Testament doctrine and the expected
complexities of the sophisticated theology common to speculative thinkers
today.
The work is divided into three chapters. The first introduces the reader
to the life of Hervaeus Natalis, his basic writings, and the character of
the controversies over the Real Presence and Transubstantiation
after
the death of Thomas Aquinas. The second offers a brief treatment of
the views of Aquinas and Hervaeus concerning the mode of Christ's
presence, discusses in some detail Hervaeus's conception of relational presence, and considers the positions of Durand of St. Pourgain and Giles of
Rome. It takes up the problem of quantity in the Eucharist and concludes
with an overview of the relevant disputations between Hervaeus and
Durand. The third chapter treats the question of Transubstantiation
as decided by Giles of Rome, Henry of Ghent, Godfrey of Fontaines,
James of Metz (through an anonymous commentator), and Durand; and
the question of consubstantiation as decided by John Quidort of Paris
and William of Occam.
Plotnik succeeds in presenting clearly the positions of the opponents,
even though, at times, they appear to be over-simplified, and he sets
in good historical perspective their textual bases. It is his purpose to bring
to the attention of current theologians the variety of the Scholastic efforts
made to come to grips with the mysteriousness of Christ's presence in the
Eucharist. Granting to each exponent a measure of honest self-criticism
and a passion for orthodoxy, he presents their various attempts to elaborate
the elusive mystery central to Christian theology and explains the
methodology used in the achievement and defense of each position.
In the doctrinal portion of the work the author gives a central posture
to the teaching of Aquinas. For the Angelic Doctor, Christ is present by
way of substance, and the matter and form of the bread and wine are
changed into the matter and form of Christ's body. This establishes
a relationship between Christ and the Eucharist. In addition to the fact
that Aquinas's own theories concerning the Real Presence were controverted, disputes arose over the explicitation of this relationship.
Hervaeus Natalis, a generation after Aquinas, restated and defended the
Thomistic views without greatly developing them. Employing the principle
of incomprehensibility, Hervaeus neglected the Thomistic "mode of sub-

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353

stance " formula in favor of an emphasis on what the presence of Christ
in the Eucharist is not (non-local, non-positional).
Other views are as follows: Giles of Rome held that the entire substance
of the bread is changed into the matter alone of Christ's body; Henry
of Ghent and the pluralists held that the matter of the bread is changed
into the matter of Christ's body, but the form of the bread is changed
into the form of Christ's body as into a form different from the rational
soul; Godfrey of Fontaines held that the matter of the bread somehow
had to remain in the body of Christ in order to avoid annihilation;
Durand and the anonymous student of James of Metz taught that the
form of the bread is replaced by the soul of Christ with the matter of
the bread remaining; John Quidort of Paris held a doctrine of consubstantiation, later termed impanation, in which the substance of bread
remains, but not in the supposit of bread, having been drawn into the
supposit of Christ. In the case of the student of James of Metz, the
relationship between the bread and the body of Christ became accidental,
and with John Quidort, the substance of the bread remained alongside the
substance of the body of Christ.
Durand, the most noteworthy opponent of Aquinas and Hervaeus,
promoted a doctrine of relational presence in that, for him, the immediate
relation of the body of Christ to the bread causes the Real Presence.
The substance of the bread is changed into the body of Christ in such
a way that the form of the bread is corrupted or the matter of the
bread is subsumed under the form of the body of Christ and this suddenly
and by divine power. In the controversy between Hervaeus and Durand
especially, but in the views of all controverialists in this dispute to a
degree, the limitations imposed by Scholastic metaphysics are evident.
In spite of the differences among the disputants, the basic directive and
informative concepts of Scholasticism-quantity,
relation, accident, substance, matter and form, can be seen at work.
One should not look to this study for a definitive statement of orthodox
Eucharistic theology to end the controversies but for textual validation
of expressions and interpretations of the views of the principals. In
accepting Aquinas's view as a start, Plotnik explicitates the manner in
which others strove to go farther and deeper in their search for expressions of revealed truth. Without reducing truly theological or metaphysical
arguments to mere semantics, he offers a basis for re-thinking " minority "
opinions and allows for broader tolerance among modem theologians in their
common effort to penetrate the mysteries and to express that most
valuable understanding in suitable formulas. The author ends on a note
of ecumenical hope which, he says, arises " out of the possibility for
diversity in the expression of common Christian beliefs."
Because this study deals primarily with Hervaeus Natalis, one would

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expect an adequate evaluation of the opinions of this " Doctor Rarus,"
but there is none. It would appear valuable for the author to have clarified
the teaching of Hervaeus and suggest some probable applications of his
principle and method of " negative knowledge." Because so many current
philosophers and theologians lay claim to progress through the study and
extrapolation of non-being, this clarification and speculation could possibly
have held some significance.
Subsequent printings of the monograph should be rid of an unfortunate
typographical error (p.
which mars the otherwise readable text and
forfeits the full meaning of the paragraph. But for this, Plotnik's work
comes as a contribution to any theological library. Its appearance in the
midst of many non-Scholastic approaches to theological inquiry is encouraging. Many more monographs of this kind are called for by the work
of illustrious historians like M. Grabmann, D. Callus, M.D. Chenu, H.
Denifle, F. Ehrle, P. Glorieux, Ag. de Guimaraes, B. Haureau, J. Koch,
F. Pelster, F. Stegmiiller, F. Van Steenberghen, J. Weisheipl, etc., who
in the past devoted painstaking effort to uncover the riches of medieval
theological writing. The science of theology has yet to assimilate fully
some aspects of Scholastic thought. Work such as this will help m that
assimilation.
As is expected in an historical survey, the only originality in this
study seems to be found in the author's attempt to reconstruct the arguments of Hervaeus once presented in his Evidentiae (Munster Universitiitsbibliothek Ms 175, lost in WW II) from the counter-arguments of Durand
contained in Durand's Sentences, Wherever possible, Plotnik seeks confirmation for translations, interpretations, and presentations of arguments
from recognized authorites. He includes a valuable and rather complete
bibliography.

F. J. RoENscH
St. Gerard'a Rectory
Mibwaukee, Wiaconain

Contemporary Problems in Moral Theology. By CHARLES E. CuRRAN.
Notre Dame, Indiana: Fides Publishers, 1970. Pp.
$6.50.
This volume gathers together five previously published essays on social
ethics, sexuality, genetics, natural law, and the sacrament of penance.
The only thing new about the book is the addition of a final chapter in
which an attempt is made to assess trends and approaches current in
Catholic and Protestant moral theology today. The interest of Curran's
work lies not so much in raising some of the main problem areas in moral

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355

theology at present as in highlighting the underlying problem in all these
areas, namely, the question of methodology. As the author says, methodological problems are central in most sciences today.
As might be expected in a work of this kind, there is a great deal of
repetition. In many places the same strictures are made against the
inadequacy of past approaches to moral issues. The traditional Catholic
moral theology of the manuals was insufficiently conscious of the evolutionary character of world history; it suffered from a simplistic view
of the supernatural as something added to the natural; it failed to take
sufficient account of the existence of sin and its effect on the humallj
situation; it was too legalistic and absolutist. No doubt there is much
in these criticisms, but they have often been made in recent times and
there seems little to be gained in continued repetition without a deeper
critical analysis in view of positive reconstruction. One feels that these
criticisms are themselves overly simplistic.
The main disappointment of this work is its failure to elaborate any
systematic new methodology. It is easier to point out deficiencies in the
older approaches than to rebuild on the foundations of the old. The author
makes no claim to do this and perhaps he is not to be blamed, considering
the present state of moral theology both inside and outside the Catholic
Church. His aim is more modest, namely, to act as a commentator on the
way things seem to be developing in the moral field. In this perspective
his work is clear and readable.
Insofar as he commits himself at all, Curran endeavors to adopt a stance
between an existentialism which is so immersed in the present that it has
no adequate criteria of judgment of the present situation and the classicist approach which, in his view, unduly universalizes and absolutizes
ethical norms of moral action. In this sense one may say that he attempts
to take a balanced position. He suggests that a modern methodology
ought to embrace three different yet complementary elements: I) the
distinction between the subjective and objective orders, making allowance
for a morality of growth which recognizes that many are as yet unable
to achieve the fullness of objective morality, 2) the theory of compromise,
based on a realization of the existential reality of sin in the individual and
society, and 3) the refusal to identify the moral act with the physical
structure of the action, with the consequent denial of negative moral
absolutes when an act is described only in terms of its physical structure.
These ideas are accepted without further analysis or investigation and
practical conclusions are drawn from them as though they were thoroughly
established. This seems to me unwarranted, especially as the so-called
theory of compromise has met with serious objections. Also, while it
is true that the moral action cannot be identified with the physical
structure of the act, it does not necessarily follow that this physical struc-

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BOOK REVIEWS

ture may not provide a norm for judging the morality of the total
human action.
In the light of these shortcomings one cannot but feel uneasy about some
of the practical judgments Father Curran makes in the course of this
volume. He does not claim certitude for them but puts them forward as
instances of the kind of conclusions to which his premisses logically
lead. Thus he suggests that euthanasia does not merit total condemnation
in all cases, that direct abortion is not always wrong, that masturbation
is not always grave matter and usually not so important, that homosexual
actions do not generally involve the person in mortal sin, that sexual
intercourse outside marriage in some cases may not be wrong, that in the
sacrament of penance it is not always necessary to confess all mortal
sins nor to list them in subsequent confessions. These instances of current
approaches to moral issues indicate the hesitancy and uncertainty of many
moralists today, a state of affairs which the author maintains will continue
in the future.
The professional theologian will find little new in this volume. Pastors
and students of moral theology may be enlightened about present problems
and trends but, in the absence of a well worked-out elaboration of
moral principles, may be either disturbed or confused by the author's
practical judgments. The work could be of use to non-Catholic theologians
as evidence of Catholic moralists' concern to update their science in the
light of modern developments, as well as to build a bridge towards
Protestant ethics. But if there is one thing that emerges from the book,
it is the pressing need of further investigation into the fundamental
problem of moral methodology.

B. A. LEWIS, c. ss. R.
Redemptorist Seminary,
Ballarat, Victoria,
Australia.

Contemporary Protestant Thought. By C. J. CURTIS. New York:

The

Bruce Publishing Company, 1970. Pp. !'l!'l5. $6.95.
This is one of the volumes in the Ecclesial Theology section in the
Contemporary Theology Series of the Bruce Publishing Company. It
should be valuable for a college-level survey course, but its use outside
the college classroom will be limited.
Curtis's explicit intention is to " contribute to the construction of the
ecumenical theology of the great church of the future." He has gathered
summaries of the thought of a wide variety of comtemporary theologians;

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357

his ecumenical theology indeed hopes to embrace all. Nathan Soderblom
is the Protestant parallel to Pope John XXIII in ecumenical thought.
The process theology of John B. Cobb, Jr., Schubert Ogden, and Teilhard de Chardin offers, in Curtis's estimation, the greatest promise for
future ecumenical work. Karl Barth, Emil Brunner, and Reinhold
Niebuhr are examples of neo-orthodox theology; Paul Tillich and Rudolf
Bultmann are the existentialist theologians presented by Curtis. There
is, of course, a chapter dealing with the radical theology of Thomas
J. J. Altizer, William Hamilton, and Paul van Buren. Judaism is represented by Martin Buber, Eastern Orthodoxy by Nicolas Berdyaev. The
line which runs from Dietrich Bonhoeffer to Harvey Cox to Joseph
Fletcher is analyzed in some detail. And, finally, there is a good chapter
concerned with Martin Luther King, Jr.'s contribution to American
theology.
The strength of this book is in its heavy dependence on the exact words
of the men being considered; Curtis presents well-chosen quotations rather
than his own summaries. However, no one could hope adequately to cover
the thought of so many men in one volume. Hence, a teacher using this
text should be familiar with the principal works excerpted by Curtis if
he hopes to give some understanding to his students. This will also serve
as a check to be certain that Curtis has not selected only those quotations
which help him to make his point.
The inherent weakness of any book purporting to treat of contemporary
thought is that it is necessarily incomplete; such a book cannot include
the works written since it was sent to the publisher. It is for this reason
that the significant changes in the recent thought of Harvey Cox are not
included by Curtis; Secular City is Cox's last work analyzed by Curtis.
Similarly missing is any consideration of the theology of hope, which
responds in some way to the radical theology of the mid-1960's. It is
especially regretable that Curtis was unable to include a chapter on hope:
no doubt, he would have welcomed it as a way of inviting Marxism into
his "ecumenical theology of the great church of the future." One gets
the feeling that Curtis very much wants to include all ways of thought
under his ecumenical cover. (Incidentally, I find it strange that there
is not a chapter about John A. T. Robinson, a not insignificant thinker
well before this volume was published.)
Curtis's criticism and analysis is limited; he is almost never negative in
his evaluations, reflecting his efforts to build a totally inclusive ecumenical
theology. Two areas of thought (process theology and secular theology)
come in for high praise. Secular theology is valuable because it addresses
modern technological man. Process thought offers a good tool for a
systematic ecumenical theology. Curtis surely demands a philosophy for
his ecumenical theology, and Whitehead is obviously his philosopher. I

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agree that process thought offers great potential in this regard. Nevertheless, I do not think that a common philosophy necessarily leads to
an ecumenical theology. Theology begins with a faith-stance, and it can
then use philosophy in an effort to offer some degree of understanding
about that faith-stance. As long as men believe different things, we
cannot expect any theology to gain their universal approval. It may be
true that we could all agree on some type of process philosophy as a
way of understanding reality (Curtis strongly emphasizes that Chardin is
a Catholic as well as a process thinker), but such a common philosophy
can never wipe out creedal differences.
We are to be reminded that Catholic theology takes dogmas seriously;
Protestant efforts at ecumenism often tend to forget this key point. Curtis
very clearly recognizes the existing differences between Catholic and
Protestant moral theologies, and I think that he appreciates that this
will offer a great obstacle to any common moral theolgy. But he seems
not to be greatly disturbed about what we could call dogmatic theology.
We must recognize that very concept of "dogma" is rooted in a philosophy
which allows for immutable and absolute truth. Most statements of
process philosophy are directly opposed to anything absolute and immutable; process thinkers would quickly label " dogma " part of the static,
substance philosophy which they reject.
I am not without hope that process thought will find its place in Catholic
theology. Catholic theologians of recent decades have begun to grapple
with the " development of dogma," a topic which could surely stand the
light of process theology. But at the present time process thinkers are still
much too polemical in their writings; they still find it necessary always
to throw little (and not so little) barbs at substance philosophy and
substance philosophers, among whom they would list Thomas Aquinas.
Catholic theologians will always be on the defensive in such an atmosphere;
they will continue to point to the glaring problems which Whitehead',
philosophy brings to the theological endeavor. The day will come when
process thinkers realize that they can hold their own in any intellectual
discussion without resorting to stinging body blows at those antiquated
substance philosophers. We must hope that Catholic theologians, off the
defensive, will be able to appreciate what process thought offers them.
Then all theologians can work for a truly ecumenical theology in those
areas where they share a common faith-stance.
WILLIAM

Albertua Magnus College
NlrW Haven, Connecticut

J. FINAN, 0. P.

BOOK REVIEWS

Avatar and Incarnation. By GEOFFREY PARRINDER. New York:
and Noble, 1970. Pp. 296. $9.50.

859
Barnes

In India there are approximately 580,000,000 people and 98% of them
are non-Christians. These figures tell how important is the whole question
of the relationship of the Church to the non-Christian world. Fortunately
the Second Vatican Council has supplied us with magnificent guidelines
for the evangelization of these peoples. " For Christians fruitfully to give
testimony to Christ, they must be united to the others in mutual esteem
and love. They must regard themselves as real members of the groups in
which they live. They must take part in the cultural and social life through
the various contacts and occupations of human life. They must be familiar
with their national and religious traditions; with joy and reverence they
must discover the seeds of the Word hidden in these traditions." (Ad
Gentes Divinitus, n.ll)
In the Declaration on non-Christian religions the Council says: "And
so the Church exhorts her sons, with prudence and love to meet the
followers of other religions in dialogue and collaboration; while bearing
witness to the Christian faith and Christian life they should recognise,
preserve and pronwte the spiritual and moral and socio-cultural values
found among these people." (Nostra Aetate, n. 2) The Church in India
is becoming more and more alive to her role among her non-Christian
brethren. But the task is difficult and slow and full of dangers, and yet
full of hope.
Those of us who are involved in the formation of Indian missionary
priests are acutely aware of the problems; the task is so easily stated
and so difficult to execute. The Council says: " The minds of the students
must be so opened and sharpened that they may be able to have a clear
knowledge and judgement of the culture of their own people. In their
study of philosophy and theology they should thoroughly examine the
relationship between the Christian religion and the traditions and religion
of their own country." (Ad Gentes Divinitus, n. 16) It is in this context
that the present book is seen to have outstanding value and provides
great help to the professor in a Missionary Seminary.
If one has to teach the tract on the Incarnation in an Indian context
one is forced to study the doctrine of Avatar. Yet, there is no other
work on the subject in English, that I am aware of, comparable to this
one. Without Parrinder's book the Professor either has to do a great deal
of research himself or give only the briefest of comparisons between
Avatar and Incarnation. This work is comprehensive, accurate and, most
of, all balanced. I began this book with a prejudice against it. During
my first five years in India I studied Indian religiuos with Christian
experts, but when I started formally to study under non-Christian pro-

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BOOK REVIEWS

fessors and gurus I discovered there was a big difference between Hinduism
as taught by Hindus and Hinduism as taught by Christians. I stopped
reading Christian authors because I felt in our work of dialogue we must
know non-Christian teaching firsthand. Of course, not everyone has the
time, the opportunity, the gifts or the qualifications to undertake this
original study. If not, I strongly recommend Parrinder as a guide. He
succeeds in presenting the various doctrines of Avatar as the adherents
to these doctrines understand them. In these days of extreme irenicism,
especially among some foreign missionaries, it is heartening to find a
balanced judgment. He sees the riches and the dross of the Indian religiocultural heritage. Above all, he makes no attempt to read into these
various doctrines of other religions truths which are not there. Many Hindu
scholars object to this tendency of Christian scholars of reading Christianity into Hindu religious literature.
Parrinder shares one defect in common with many experts on comparative religion. He is inadequate on Christianity! I would be very
surprised if Parrinder is a Catholic. What he says is correct, but he leaves
unsaid many important aspects of the Christian theology of the Incarnation. Here in India one frequently meets Indologists who have sadly
neglected their theology and Christian traditions. Perhaps it is impossible to be an expert on more than two or three religions.
While I am happy that Parrinder has treated of avatars in Hinduism,
Buddhism, Jainism, and Islam under many aspects because this helps me
in teaching a comprehensive course on the subject, I think it would have
been better to concentrate on one religion and compare its doctrine of
Avatar with the theology of Incarnation, since this would have afforded
more scope for a deeper understanding of one theory rather than a partial
explanation of many. Also, missing from the book is the attitude of the
educated and uneducated contemporary Hindu to avatars. I,iving Hinduism is very different from textual Hinduism. Parrinder probably knows
more theoretically about Hinduism than most Hindus, but this can never
be a substitute for living among our Hindu brethren and discovering their
uneducated but authentic Hindu beliefs and customs.
In conclusion, I only hope the author undertakes comparative studies
on creation, divine maternity, sacramentality, etc. They will be a great
service to all Christians who are in immediate contact and dialogue with
non-Christians and are looking for scholarly works to guide them. The
whole Chuch in India owes a debt of gratitude to Geoffrey Parrinder for
this fine contribution towards a better understanding of central doctrines
that must form the subject of any dialogue between Christians and
brethren of Indian religions. Of course, the book was written for a wider
relationship than Christians working in India; it will be most certainly
welcomed by all students in the field of comparative religion. Neither

BOOK REVIEWS

861

my Hindu friends nor myself could find anything that we could seriously
disagree with, and we all found this book to be the best systematic,
clear, and scholarly book available on the subject of avatars in world
religions. I found his theology of the Incarnation was incomplete and less
satisfying, but there are numerous excellent works on this Christian
mystery.
BEnE McGREGGOR, 0. P.
St. Charles' Seminary

Nagpur, India

In Our Image and Likeness. Humanity and Divinity in Italian Humanist
Thought. By CHARLES TRINKHAUS. Q vols. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1970. Pp. 10QO. $QQ.50 the set.
Too often scholars have been seduced by their predilections for unity
and common characteristics. Consequently, many accounts of particular
historical periods are permeated, so to speak, by contrived descriptions of
similarities and a peculiar neglect of differences. In Our Image and Likeness, however, might be said to represent a new weave in the fabric of
this traditional historical pattern. Trinkaus says:
However, our approach will attempt, at least, to be more pluralistic and eclectic,
believing in no historical " unseen hand," whether a transcendental or an immanent
one, observing a number of humanist authors in their attempts to discuss the
condition of man, taking it for granted that the resulting statement will be the
result both of the particular character of the writer and his knowledge and
preferences among a. variety of traditional material and viewpoints available at
that time for his adoption. (p. 175, Vol. 1)

In the final analysis a common characteristic of humanism does emerge,
but it is tempered by Trinkaus's recognition of the philosophical ambiance
in which differences figure prominently. (See p. 761)
The two volumes which consist of nearly a thousand pages (including
an extensive selection of relevant original quotations, a Bibliography and
a useful Index of Names and Works) is divided into four parts. One of
the theses which Trinkaus hopes to sustain by this fourpart investigation
is that the humanists' conceptions of the " nature, condition and destiny
of man " cannot be understood without reference to the framework of
Christianity in which they were originally defined. Trinkaus claims that
the humanists' acceptance of Augustinian and patristic assumptions, and
their dissatisfaction with classical moral philosophy and scholasticism,
had a profound effect on the conception of man which resulted from
their labors. Moreover, he argues that the Italian humanists' distinctive

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BOOK REVIEWS

intellectual orientation, their concern for studia humanitatu, provided an
important kind of leadership in the Renaissance search for a new vision
of man. Since the Italian humanist sought to reconcile the prevailing
sense of significant human achievement within the conceptual framework
of the Church, he was considered the harbinger of a cultural idiom that
some feel was only ultimately fulfilled in the Reformation.
According to Trinkaus, the humanists' vision of man was engendered by
(I) the patristic exegesis of Genesis which Trinkaus quotes as: "And
he said: 'Let us make man in our own image, after our likeness'." (p.
XIV, Vol. I), and (2) those harsher notions of the misery of man which
derive force from the Biblical theme concerning man's Fall. Trinkaus
interprets these conceptions as the peculiar expression of two distinct
but related Christian literary genres-the Dignitas hominu and the Mueria
humanae conditionu. Although his emphasis on the theological quality
of humanism has been anticipated in more than in obiter dicta by G.
Tofl'anin in his Storica dell'Umanesimo and C. Angelieri in his Il problema
religioso del Rinascimento (as well as many others) , Trinka us does provide the reader with some interesting insights and a lucid exposition of
several important but virtually neglected Italian humanists.
In Part I Trinkaus explores certain of the works of Petrarch, Salutati,
and Valia in order to illustrate that their respective views on the nature
of man were formulated in light of (and moreover, profoundly influenced
by) their Christian beliefs. In particular, their concern with the nature
of man presupposed prior theological conceptions of the relation of God
to man. Thus, the studia humanitatu and the studia divinitatis are not
separable-one cannot be understood adequately in isolation from the
other.
All three humanists endeavored to define the nature of man in terms
of his relation to an omnipotent yet merciful God. Questions such as the
extent of man's determination, the extent of his sinfulness, and the relation
of the will to the intellect, occupied a pre-eminent place in their thought.
Oddly enough, their labors with these queries did not give birth to three
homogeneous systems. Since they shared an essentially Augustinian and
patristic viewpoint, however, one does find similarities among them. These
similarities are for the most part simply their polemics against the scholastic
and classical notions of the superiority of the intellect as a dominant
human faculty. Nonetheless, Trinkaus holds that their "anti-dialectical"
and " anti-metaphysical " dispositions are by no means trivial. For these
humanists hoped to move beyond the limits of classical philosophy, logic,
and metaphysics to Christian rhetoric, theologia rhetorica, for example,
as expressed by Valla. Therefore, theologia rhetorica functioned as man's
instrument in virtue of which he could aid or impede the process of divine
providence. In fact, it is Trinkaus's view that " an essential historical

BOOK REVIEWS

368

motivation for the emergence of humanism itself is contained in this
struggle to achieve a new synthesis between the traditional religious faith
of medieval Europe and the new social, economic, political, geographical,
sensual, secular experiences of the men of the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries .... " (p. 556, Vol.
In Part II Trinkaus proceeds to an exposition of the work of several
humanists who were strongly influenced by the thinkers in Part I. Basically,
the humanists Trinkaus has selected represent the Renaissance preoccupation with the themes concerning man's dignity and misery-the
seemingly antithetical Biblical themes of the Creation and the Fall.
Here Trinkaus considers such thinkers as Bartolomeo Facio, Fra Antonio
da Barga, Giannozzo Manetti (whose importance in this era has, by
the way, not infrequently been overlooked), Benedetto Morandi, and
Aurelio Brandolini. Trinkaus sees the humanists' struggle to reconcile the
tension between the dignity and misery of man as the context out of which
the Platonists of the late Quattrocentro and the Neo-Stoic representative
of Paduan Aristotelianism, Pietro Pompanazzi, elaborate their views
regarding man's place in the universe. It is clear, however, that
thinks that the dignity of man and the misery of the human condition are
complementary rather than exclusive themes. Thus, it would be misleading to suggest that his treatment of these themes in Part II shows
them to be unrelated.
It would be fair to say, I think, that Part III is devoted to an exposition
of the work of certain of the Renaissance Platonists who were most
strongly influenced by the humanist tradition. Trinkaus's selection is by
no means exhaustive, nor was it meant to be. This section is simply an
attempt to demonstrate the impact which the humanists had on later
thinkers, and the list includes such well-known names as Marsilio Ficino
whose Faustian philosophy of man exemplified a maximization, so to
say, of the earlier humanist views. Trinkaus says:
I think it is possible therefore to claim that Ficino's exposition of the dignity
and excellence of man is genuinely the culmination of the previous humanists' efforts
not only in the sense that many major arguments are recapitulated but also
because it goes beyond them in the depth, extent and completeness of its vision
of man. (p. 476, Vol. 2)

For Ficino, man is no longer simply the image of God-now man has
attained divinity in this world as well as in the next. Besides his detailed
exposition of Ficino's views on immortality Trinkaus discusses the religious
and poetic vision of Giovanni Picco who argues that man's dignity
derives from both his origin and from his restoration by Christ who
is the absolute consummation of all men. Egidio da Viterbo is also included
in this part, but the account Trinkaus gives of him must be considered
cursory. In fact, Trinkaus's comments about Egidio, which extend for

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BOOK REVIEWS

less than four pages, seem much more like an historical token than a
satisfactory way of substantiating an historical point.
The last personality covered in Part III is Pietro Pomponazzi, and
Trinkaus's explication of his views is highly suggestive and interesting.
Trinkaus does well to contrast Pomponazzi with Morandi and Ficino,
and his references to other relevant thinkers is extremely helpful. His
perspicacious integration and comparison of sundry important thinkers
(i. e., Bruni, Valla, Garzoni, etc.) with the visions of Pomponazzi make
this one of his best chapters.
Part IV is a prodigious examination of the implications of the humanists'
endeavor to define man against the background of the Christian faith and
their own experience of the world. The implications of their philological
concerns for traditional theological formulations are teased-out with considerable minutiae. Among the many salient topics treated in this large
section some of the more interesting are: Italian humanism and its
relation to the Scriptures as studia humanitatis and theologica poetica,
the relation of humanist thought to the Sacraments as a new kind of
religious emphasis, that is, the shift of emphasis from technical or logical
argument to persuasive rhetorical treatises that could move individuals
to a believing state of mind, the influence of humanism relevant to the
dichotomy between clergy and laity, and the effect of humanist thought
on the conception of poetry and the specific metamorphosis of theolog ia
poetica to theologia platonica in the work of Cristoforo Landino.
Now that we have seen, at least in abbreviated form, the general
format of the volumes, it seems apposite to offer some specific remarks
about them that may be helpful to the reader. In a work such as this
that purports to cover a large area of controversial scholarship it is
inevitable that there will be defects, some more easily corrigible than
others. Let us look first at what might be called a " minor blemish."
Although it is minor, it is nonetheless serious because it is one that
pervades the whole work. It seems to me that there are certain mechanical defects in literary style that leave much to be desired. Unfortunately
(at least in these volumes) Trinkaus does not in general write engagingly.
Many of his sentences, particularly in the first volume, are inordinately
long and are not eminently readable. Trinkaus states, for example:
It is my view, without wishing to push it too far or make it into a thesis, that the
popularity of St. Augustine among the humanists generally and specifically in the
case of Salutati, was based not only on the fact that he was a "classical-Christian,"
an ancient against the recent or contemporary modems, not only on the inherent
appeal of his arguments, but on Augustine's appropriateness in combating the very
tendencies in medieval thought which Riiegg rightly insists Salutati was trying to
oppose (although I believe Riiegg has mixed up the individuals), namely naturalistic determinism and some, but not all, varieties of nominalism. (p. 57, Vol. 1)

And, in contrast to this excessively complex style, one is struck by an

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BOOK REVIEWS

occasional but patently turgid phrase such as " ... fitfully guided, perhaps,
by an officious band of fratiunculi swilling in an unctious and morbid
display of hypocritical sentiment."
(p. xxii, Vol. 1) Indeed, it is distressing to discover that such a scholarly work should occasionally smack
of pedantry.
A second and more serious query is whether Trinkaus succeeds in
delivering what he has promised. He asserts:
The central conclusion of this book is that the Italian Renaissance, conceived
essentially along Burckhardtian lines, was accompanied by a powerful assertion of
a philosophy of will by leading representatives of Italian humanism and among
philosophical circles influenced by them. (p. xx, Vol. I)

Despite his informative and persuasive epilogue it is not at all clear that
Trinkaus has explicated his sources sufficiently enough to justify his central
conclusion. There is little doubt that Trinkaus's exposition of the humanists and related thinkers is for the most part judicious. It is difficult, however, to sort out any one consistent thesis amidst his fertile exposition.
Thus his occasional summary remarks look like unfamiliar landmarks along
a familiar route. Perhaps this topographical confusion is due to the fact
that the exposition he has offered accommodates and, in fact, inspires more
than one thesis. Even his claim that " the idea of human nature during
the Renaissance cannot be other than the conception of man's nature
in its relation to the divine nature, and in a subsidiary way in relation
to animal nature as well" (p. xiv, Vol. 1) seems too strong. Trinkaus
has shown, I think, that the idea of human nature during the Renaissance
cannot be understood without reference to the humanists' struggle with
a conception of their own nature in relation to divine nature. He has
by no means demonstrated, however, that this idea of human nature can
be reduced solely to the humanists' conception of human nature in
relation to divine nature. Moreover, his claim that "thus this book will
deal with ideas concerning ' humanity and divinity ' in all their aspects "
(p. xiv, Vol. 1) is simply extravagant. Since Trinkaus has only been
able to present a limited number of humanists, it is apparent that his
unrestricted affirmation is necessarily specious.
One cannot help but feel that Trinkaus has not tried hard enough to
sort out adequately a single thesis. Thus the reader is left with many
strands that look like theses but which remain united to the appropriate
historical evidence. Nonetheless, his historical exposition of the Italian
humanists is commendable, and his insights concerning humanist thought
are interesting. What the volumes lack in terms of a single and justified
thesis (perhaps more appropriately a philosophical and not an historical
prize) is balanced by the plethora of information resident in them.
RoNALD

St. John's OoUege
University of Cambridge
England

S. LAURA

BOOKS RECEIVED
American Bible Society: The Psalms for Modern Man. (Pp.
Ateneo University Publications: Logos 4. God as Person in the Writings
of Martin Buber, by Pedro C. Sevilla, S.J. (Pp. 170, $3.00).
Branch-Smith, Inc.: The Development of Lester Ward's World Views,
by Alvin Nelson. (Pp. 75, $3.93).
Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Scientificas: Jacobus M. Ramirez
Omnia Opera. Tomus I. De Ipsa Philosophia in Universum. I
(Pp. i-xxxii,
II (Pp.
Ed. by Victorino Rodriguez,
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East-West Center Press: A Primer of Sow Zen, by Dogen, trans. by
Reih6 Masunaga. (Pp. 119, $6.00).
Editrice Citta Nuova: Grecia e Roma nella Storia delle Religioni, by
Giuseppe Graneris. (Pp. 393) .
Fides Publishers: Metropolis: Christian Presence and Responsibility, ed.
by Philip D. Morris. (Pp.
Theology Today Series. 21
The Christian Social Conscience, by Rodger Charles, S. J. (Pp.
95); 18 Theology and Spirituality, by John Dalrymple. (Pp. 95);
16 The Theology of St. Paul, by Henry W ansbrough, 0. S. B. (Pp.
96);
The Theology of the Word of God, by Aloysius Church,
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Fundamental Research Press: The Riddle of the Individual and his Universe, by Julius Hyman. (Pp. 134, $8.50).
Harper & Row: The Moral Rules. A New Rational Foundartion for
Morality, by Bernard Gert. (Pp.
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Editorial Herder, S. A.: El Bien comun y la moral politica, by E. Garcia
Estt\bafiez, 0. P. (160 pts).
Inter-Varsity Press: Teilhard de Chardin: An Analysis and Assessment,
by D. Gareth Jones. (Pp.
Modern Art and the Death
of a Culture, by H. R. Rookmaaker. (Pp.
$3.95) ; What is
Human? by T. M. Kitwood. (Pp.
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The Church at the End of the 20th Century, by Francis A.
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Salley & Ronald Behm. (Pp. 114, $1.95).
Irades-COP: Humanae Vitae. Analisi e Orientamenti Pastorali, by Lino
Ciccone. (Pp.
Kozik, Ignatius S.: The First Desert Hero. St. Jerome's VITA PAuLI, by
Ignatius S. Kozik. (Pp. 60,
.

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867

Louisiana State University Press: The New American Philosophers, by
Andrew J. Reck. (Pp. 383, $8.95) .
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Newman Press: God Within Process, by Eulalio R. Baltazar. (Pp. 186,
$5.95)

0

Martinus Nijhoff: Morality in Evolution. The Moral Philosophy of Henri
Bergson, by Idella J. Gallagher. (Pp. 112, guilders 18,-) .
Oxford University Press: God and Rationality, by Thomas F. Torrance.
(Pp. 225, $9.00); Johannes Blund. Tractatus DE ANIMA, ed. by
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Paulist Press: A Survey of Catholic Theology 1800-1970 by T. M. Schoof.
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Philosophical Library: Dictionary of Pagan Religions, by Harry E. Wedeck
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G. P. Putnams's Sons: The Spirit of American Philosophy, by Gerlad
Myers. (Pp. 350, $2.45) .
Schocken Books: Faith and Philosophical Enquiry, by D. Z. Phillips. (Pp.
285, $9.00); The Essential Philo (Philo Judaeus), ed. by Nahum N.
Glazer. (Pp. 372, $3.95).
University of California Press: A Wittgenstein Handbook, by Christopher
Coope, Peter Geach, Timothy Potts, Roger White. (Pp. 51, $1.75).
University of Kansas Dept. of Philosophy: Buber and Buberism. A Critical
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University of Notre Dame Press: Evolution in Perspective. Commentaries in Honor of Pierre Lecomte du Nouy, ed. by George N.
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