JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?
VIOLENCE AND THE SACRED IN THE THEOLOGY
OF RAYMUND SCHWAGER

D

WITH THE received vocabulary for interpreting Jesus's crucifixion is widespread among contemporary theologians. While adamantly opposed to
saying that" the death of Jesus merely convinces us of a forgiving and salvific will of God which is absolutely independent of
this death," Karl Rahner maintains that interpretation of the
crucifixion in such categories as expiatory sacrifice is but a secondary and derivative way of expressing the basic Christian
conviction that" we are saved because this man who is one of
us has been saved by God, and God has thereby made his salvific will present in the world historically, really and irrevocably." 1 Against the background of a different theology of death,
Edward Schillebeeckx has stressed that understanding Jesus's
death as an atoning, redemptive act is merely one of several
New Testament ways of interpreting the crucifixion and argued
that, while Christians are bound to whatever is entailed in
Jesus, they are not committed to the use of such terms as
propitiation, substitution, satisfaction and sacrifice in the articulation of their faith. 2 Hans Kung likewise holds that" the
universal significance of the death on the cross ' for us,' ' for the
many,' 'for all,' can ... be expressed in different ways" and
insists that " the permanent, definitive and irrevocable significance and effect of Jesus' death ... must ... be freed from the
ISCONTENT

1 Foundations of Christian Faith (New York:
Seabury, 1978), pp. !l8!l, !l84.
Cf. also "The One Christ and the Universality of Salvation," Theological, Investigations 16 (New York: Seabury, 1979), pp. 199-!l!l4.
•Jesus: An Experiment in Christology (New York: Seabury, 1970), pp. !!74-!l94,
818; Christ: The Experience of Jesus as Lord (New York: Seabury, 1980), pp.
681-684; Interim Report on the Books "Jesus" and "Christ" (London, SCM,
1980)' p. 16.

178

174

JOHN P. GALVIN

restrictions of the older terminology." 3 While some prominent
theologians have recently re-emphasized the need to express the
meaning of Jesus's death as death for us,4 no single constructive
theory of redemption dominates contemporary theology, and
efforts to articulate the salvific character of the crucifixion continue to form a major topic in current christological literature.
One of the many recent soteriological proposals is of particula.r interest. Drawing heavily on the anthropology of Rene
Girard, Raymund Schwager, a Swiss Jesuit theologian, has begun to develop a distinctive new approach to the ancient problem of interpreting Jesus's death. While his project has evoked
considerable response in Europe, it has attracted little notice
in the United States. Against the background of an outline of
Girard's work (I), this essay will present the basic elements
of Schwager's soteriology (II), survey the critical reception of
his theory (III) , and conclude with a few evaluative remarks
on its contribution to contemporary theology (IV) .

I
" For without a cement of blood (it must be human, it must
be innocent) no secular wall will safely stand." 5
Formerly professor of French at the State University of New
York in Buffalo and at Johns Hopkins, now again resident in
his native France, Rene Girard began his studies with analyses
of the novels of Cervantes, Stendhal, Flaubert, Proust and
Dostoevsky, 6 but subsequently expanded his range of inquiry
8 On Being a Christian (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1976), p. 426.
•Cf. Hans Urs von Balthasar, "Crucifixus etiam pro nobis," Internationale
Katholische Zeitschrift "Communio" 9 (1980) e6-85, and Martin Hengel, The
Atonement: The Origins of the Doctrine in the New TcJtament (Philadelphia:
Fortress, 1981).
• W. H. Auden, "Horae Canonicae," Collected Poems (ed. Edward Mendelson;
London: Faber and Faber, 1976), p. 484. The passage is cited by Girard at the
close of an interview reprinted in "To Double Business Bound:" Essays on
Literature, Mimesis and Anthropology (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University,
1978)' p. 229.
•Deceit, Desire, and the Novel: Self and Other in Literary Structure (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University, 1965).

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

175

to encompass additional literary works, such as Greek tragedies,
and ethnological material. 7 In the course of these wide-ranging
investigations of classical and modern literature, the history of
religion and cultural anthropology, he has proposed a highly
original and rather comprehensive anthropological theory,
which in turn has been adopted by Raymund Schwager as the
hermeneutical framework for a contemporary soteriology.
The heart of Girard's theory is the conviction that analysis
of the disparate material he has examined yields a unified underlying conception of human desire as essentially triangular:
in itself undetermined as to object, human desire acquires specification through mimesis, the election and imitation of a model
to whom is transferred the selection of objects for pursuit. 8 In
the resulting triangle, the model occupies a mediating role between the desiring subject and the desired object. Since the
objects of desire are limited and particular, "if one individual
imitates another when the latter appropriates some object, the
result cannot fail to be rivalry or conflict," 9 for " the mediator
can no longer act his role of model without also acting or ap ...
pearing to act the role of obstacle." 10 Since the mediator "prevents us from satisfying a desire which he himself has inspired
in us," 11 mimetic desire issues ineluctably in a mutually conditioned mixture of veneration and hatred, as the subject's desire
to imitate its model is of itself partially transformed into a desire to supplant it.
A basic anthropological datum, mimetic rivalry quickly
erupts in sudden outbreaks of violence and " rapidly tends
toward interminable revenge," 12 thus threatening the very
foundations of human life and society. Contending that this
tendency is not adequately controlled by instinctive inhibitions,
7 Cf. "To Double Business Bound"
and especially Violence and the Sacred
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1977).
8 Cf. especially Deceit, Desire, and the Novel, pp. 1-52.
•" To Double Business Bound," p. vii.
10 Deceit, Desire, and the Novel, p. 7.
11 Ibid., p. 10.
11 " To Double Business Bound," p. vii.

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JOHN P. GALVIN

and rejecting as a myth of the Enlightenment the idea of a
"social contract," Girard expands his field of inquiry beyond
literary texts to include ethnological material, and suggests as
a result of these investigations that the very process which produces aggression also provides a mechanism for its partial control.13 A fortuitous violent triumph attracts imitation and
entices others to participate in the attack on the arbitrarily
chosen common target. The joint destruction of the victim produces a certain solidarity among the aggressors and in this way
achieves a restoration of order, temporary though this may be.
In the course of this process, the victim itself assumes a numinous character. The projection of all hostility onto it causes it
to appear as a monstrous reality, a foreign intruder which disrupts the unity and stability of a society. Yet, since its destruction restores the threatened order and establishes peace, the
victim also appears as a mysterious savior. It thus combines
the contrary attributes often considered characteristic of the
sacred, as it is both tremendum and fascinosum. 14 Girard terms
this process the "scapegoat mechanism," and judges it to be
the primal event which makes human society possible.15
Since the salutary effects of the scapegoat mechanism can be
perpetuated only if the process is repeated at periodic intervals,
the primal event gives rise to institutionalized ritual sacrifices.
Despite the variety of concrete forms which such practices have
assumed in the course of history, Girard argues that religious
rites are at bottom one, unified in their origin from the universal
problem of mimetic violence and in their effect of enabling and
stabilizing human society: "All religious rituals spring from the
surrogate victim, and all the great institutions of mankind, both
secular and religious, spring from ritual". 16 Knowledge of the
origin and function of the scapegoat mechanism, however, neeCf. especially Violence and the Sacred, pp. 1-67, 89-118, 309-318.
Cf. e.g. Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy (New York: Oxford University,
1958). German original: Breslau, 1917.
15 In his argumentation,
Girard moves from an interpretation of sacrificial rites
to the positing of a real event, dimly reflected in them, as their historical origin.
1 • Violence and the Sacred, p. 306.
13

14

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177

essarily remains hidden, for its efficacy depends on its beneficiaries' ignorance of its true nature.
The stabilization of order achieved by the scapegoat mechanism is always fragile. To prescind from other factors, the sheer
repetition of the sacrificial act inevitably occasions changes in
the classification of the victim, and any modification of this
sort, however minute, "risks undermining the whole sacrificial
structure." 17 If the gap between the surrogate victim and the
community grows too wide, the victim will no longer attract the
violent impulses to itself; if the continuity between victim and
community becomes too great, violence will overflow from the
ritual event into the rest of life. In either case, the rite will fail
to achieve its intended goal and a" sacrificial crisis" will ensue.
In such situations, " the whole cultural foundation of the society
is put in jeopardy," for "anything that adversely affects the
institution of sacrifice will ultimately pose a threat to the very
basis of the community, to the principles on which its social
harmony and equilibrium depend." 18
Convinced of the cumulative force of his examples 19 and of
the superiority of his theory to alternative explanations of comparable phenomena, such as that of Freud, Girard has in
recent works sought to weigh the Judeo-Christian tradition
more explicitly in the light of his hypothesis, and argued that
the gospels represent the final revelation and thus destruction
of the mechanism of violence. 20 While this expansion 0£ his
thought is of considerable interest in itself, the chief concern of
this essay lies neither in Girard's application 0£ his theory to
the biblical tradition nor in critique of his work, 21 but in exIbid., p. 39.
Ibid., p. 49.
1 • Ibid., p. 306.
2 ° Cf. Les choses cacMes depuis la fondation du monde
(Paris: Grasset, 1978),
the discussion published in Esprit 41 (1973) 59?7-563, and " To Doitble Business
Bound," pp. 9?26-228.
21 In addition
to the works by and about Girard noted in George Tissot,
"Bibliographie: Rene Girard," SR 10 (1981) 109-119?, cf. George Leveque,
"Jesus, la violence et le sacrifice," in G. Bessiere et al., Dossier Jesus: recherches
nouvelles (Lyon: Chalet, 1977), pp. 111-114; S. Pinckaers, "La violence, le
17

1•

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JOHN l>. GALVIN

amination of Raymund Schwager's more detailed effort to ufr.
lize Girard's anthropology in a constructive soteriology.

n
Raymund Schwager, doctor in theology from the University
of Fribourg, former member of the editorial staff of the Swiss
Jesuit journal Orientierung (with which he retains a limited
connection) , has since 1977 been professor of dogmatics at the
University of Innsbruck. While only his more recent work
makes extensive use of Girard's anthropology, Schwager's interest in Girard is an integral part of a more comprehensive
effort to construct a renewed soteriology, the ground for which
had already been prepared in his earlier writings.
As early as his dissertation, which sought to uncover the
ecclesiology of Ignatius of Loyola by interpreting the Spiritual
Exercises against the background of Ignatius's life, Schwager
sounded two themes which have become recurrent in his theology: the need to distinguish divine revelation (Ignatius's
genuine mystical experience) from human impulse (Ignatius's
psychological inclinations), and the argument that the most
reliable sign of the former is its opposition to natural tendencies.22 In his second book, a popular but substantial treatise on
Christian discipleship, these concerns are generalized in stress
on faith's conferral of freedom from domination by subconscious psychological mechanisms, as reflected in the reversal,
rather than extension, of natural expectations. 23 Without providing a full interpretation of Jesus's life, this work anticipates
sacre et le christianisme," Nova et Vetera 54 (1979) 292-3011; Hans Urs von
Balthasar, Theodramatik 3: Die Handlung (Einsiedeln :' Johannes, 1980), pp.
276-288; Robert Le Gall, "La conception negative de !'imitation et du sacrifice
chez Rene Girard," Nova et Vetera 116 (1981) 40-50; and the helpful review of
Violence and the Sacred by Vincent Farenga_ (Comparative Literature 3!! [1980]
173-177).
••Das dramatische Kirchenverstiindnis bei Ignatius von Loyola (Einsiedeln:
Benziger, 1970).
•• Jesus-Nachfolge (Freiburg: Herder, 1973), pp. 47-64, 82, 108, 121-rn6, 130, 184,
1:39, 141, 144, 160, 168, 165, 170, 174. For a contrasting emphasis, cf. Karl
Rahner's theology of grace (summarized in Foundations, pp. 116-ISS).

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

179

later developments in Schwager's theology by insisting on the
decisive character and revelatory import of the crucifixion.2 '
A similar thrust is present in Schwager's third volume, a reflective study of the world-transforming power of faith. 25 Emphasizing the absence of violence in Jesus's conduct and preaching of the kingdom, 26 Schwager sees revelation as identifiable
in its exposure of unconsciorni mechanisms of personal and collective self-deception and hostility. 27 Toward the end of this
book, he attributes to Girard a decisive role in clarifying the
mechanism of objectifications through which man seeks control
of the Absolute, 28 and undertakes an initial effort to apply the
fruits of Girard's research to the interpretation of Jesus's life,20
thus preparing the way for the more intensive pursuit of the
same project in his later work.
Schwager's monograph on the "scapegoat theory" restricts
its investigations to the Old and New Testaments, 80 but since
its publication several articles. have evaluated some major
soteriological conceptions from post-biblical tradition. It will be
best to preserve this order in the exposition of his thought.

Old Testament
Schwager's study of the Old Testament seeks neither to provide an historical-critical exegesis of individual passages nor a
.. Jesus-Nachfolge, pp. rn7, 132, 138-139, 162, 170, 176-178.
20 Glaube, der die Welt verwandelt (Mainz: Griinewald, 1976); hereafter Glaube.
The title seems to be a deliberate variation on Rahner's Glaube, der die Erde liebt
(Freiburg: Herder, 1966).
•• Glaube, pp. 48, 58, 69, 149, 152.
ST Ibid., pp. 72-78, 96-98, IOS-105.
••Schwager cites a text of Paul Ricoeur which identifies "illusion as a
necessary structure of thought about the unconditioned " as " the radical origin
of every 'false consciousness'" (Freud and Philosophy: An Essay on Interpretation [New Haven: Yale University, 1970], p. 529), and argues that Girard has
further specified the content of this process (Glaube, p. 187).
2 • Ibid., pp. 187-142, 154.
• 0 Brauchen wir einen Siindenbock? : Gewalt und ErlOsung in den bibUschen
Schriften (Munich: Kosel, 1978); hereafter Siindenbock. A more popular essay,
"Eine neue Interpretation der Geschichte im Licht des Christentums: Zurn Werk
Rene Girards," Stimmen d(!r Zeit 197 (1979) 784-7881 shoµld als!>
n!lted.

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JOHN P. GALVIN

comprehensive investigation of all major themes. His more
modest intention is to analyze Old Testament material with
Girard's theory functioning as an hermeneutical framework,
with the twin aim of determining if the old Testament offers
suppol't-not proof-for Girard's concept and of seeing if, conversely, Girard's hypothesis is able to illuminate significant but
often neglected dimensions of the biblical text. His primary
concern in this undertaking-somewhat in the spirit of Brevard
Childs's canonical criticism 31-is with the Old Testament as an
integral whole, seen as a literary deposit of the history of Israel's
faith. 32
As an initial step, Schwager finds that elements central to
Girard's theory occupy a prominent position in the books of the
Old Testament. Human violence, discussed in more than 600
texts and condemned in such passages as Gen 6: 11 and Ezek 22
as the epitome of sin, is found to be the Old Testament's most
central and most pervasive topic. While the themes of mimesis
-Israel's pursuit of military, political and economic success
through imitation of foreign peoples in their governmental organization and their worship of idols-and of jealous rivalryas in the stories of the conflicts of Cain and Abel, Joseph and
his brothers, and Saul and David-occur frequently, Schwager's
interest is captured particularly by one aspect of the Old Testament's reflection on violence: the persecution of the righteous.
Widespread in the psalms (e.g. Pss 2; 22; 31; 118: 10-13) and
influential in the prophets (e.g. Mic 4: 11-12; Zech 12: 2-3), the
theme of the conspiracy of the violent, united in blind madness
and groundless hate under the cloak of deception, is also prominent in the sapiential literature (e.g. Wis 17: 2-20) . In both its
individual and its collective dimensions (fate of the individual
righteous sufferer; plight of Israel) , it represents a pervasive
problem for Old Testament thought. 33
31 Cf. Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripfare (Philadelphia:
Fortress,
1979), especially pp. 89-106, 659-671. But note also the critical remarks of R. N.
Whybray, "Reflections on Canonical Criticism," Theology 84 (1981), !'l9-85.
a. Sundenbock, pp. 54-57.
as Ibid., pp. 58-68, 81-91, 100-117.

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

181

Yet the theme of violence is not restricted in the Old Testament to its analysis of human activity. Yahweh himself is often
envisioned as the divine warrior, and over 1000 texts make
reference to the idea of divine vengeance. In this connection,
Schwager distinguishes four types of material, though with the
remark that the distinction between the second and third types
is more verbal than substantive: a) relatively rare passages,
such as Exod 4: Q4-26 and QSam 6: 6-8, which portray the wrath
of God as an irrational and undiscriminating fury; b) a larger
group of texts which speak of God's vengeance as a reaction to
man's evil deeds (e.g. Lev Q6: 14-39); c) a similar group of
passages in which man is not only the provocation of divine
wrath but also the instrument of divine punishment (e.g. Isa
19: Q; Ezek QI: 31); included in this category are the more than
100 texts in which Israel is commanded to kill others (e.g. Deut
QO: 16-17; lSam 15: Q-3) ; and d) a less numerous (still over 70
references) but widespread set of texts in which misdeeds are
seen as producing their own evil consequences (e.g. Ps 7: 14-16;
Prov Q6: !27). The diversity of this material leaves a certain
ambiguity about the nature of Yahweh's response to evil deeds:
Is it a positive act of punishment, or a simple turning away
from man, leaving him to his own devices? 34
For Schwager, the variations in these conceptions of God
derive in part from the projection of violent human activity
onto the divine. The gradual revelation of God, which exposes
the falsity of this procedure, finds its genuine locus in the hopeless situation of the innocent victim of universal oppression.
Though certain ambiguities remain-Is the destiny of the nations surrounding Israel destruction or conversion?-God is
revealed as the one who works through his word based in love,
delivers man from subservience to human imitation and rivalry
(cf. the story of David and Jonathan), and gathers together a
new and different community based not on violence but on the
overcoming of human hostility. 35
••Ibid., pp. 64-81.
••Ibid., pp. 76-77, 117-138.

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JOHN P. GALVIN

Intrinsic to this development is the Old Testament critique
of sacrifice. While some texts view sacrifice in a favorable light
and trace violence to the failure to sacrifice properly, others
reflect a deeper grasp of what violence is and a corresponding
realization of the futility of sacrificial rites. The prophets' massive criticism of Israel's sacrificial practices, as well as those of
foreign nations, is pertinent here. Yet, while the themes of violence and sacrifice are connected in the famous scapegoat passage (Lev 16) from which Girard draws his imagery, ambiguities remain, and the Old Testament's exposure of sacrifice as
human projection is not complete. 36
To conclude his study of the Old Testament from the perspective of Girard's reflections, Schwager turns his attention to
what he considers the most significant texts of the Old Testament, the servant songs of Second Isaiah (Isa 42: 1-9; 49: 1-6;
50: 4-9;
13-53: 12) . The new and decisive element here is
the reaction of the servant depicted as the victim of the violent.
Divinely instructed, the servant is free from human mimesis
and therefore without prayer for vengeance. His destiny as
light of the nations is achieved through his conduct under persecution, as his suffering leads to better insight on the part of his
foes. For Schwager, Second Isaiah contains the Old Testament's clearest revelation of God. Since, however, the servant
songs remain isolated and can hardly be said to 11epresent a
major influence within the Old Testament itself, the central
issue of violence and the sacred remains incompletely resolved. 31
With this interpretation of the Old Testament, the background is prepared for a re-reading of the gospel.

New Testament
While the death of Jesus is the focal point of Schwager's interpretation of the New Testament, his analysis of the crucifixion is embedded in a sketch of the central features of Jesus's
public activity. Two complementary but distinct themes are
considered.
The first perspective is primarily negative: Jesus's ministry
••Ibid., pp. 91-100.

17

Ibid., pp.

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

183

represents a decisive revelation of a hidden will to kill and lie.
Jesus's prediction of the destruction of the temple and the apo. calyptic texts of the gospels presuppose and expose violence as
the cause of the impending disasters, and the critique of the
scribes and Pharisees for their falsehood and violence (e.g. Matt
23: 29-35) uncovers the basic evil force which underlies individual misdeeds. It is this unmasking of evil which provokes open
hostility to Jesus and makes his appearance an occasion of sharp
division. As both Johannine (John 8: 40-44; 16: 2; !John 3: 1112) and Pauline (Rom 3: 10-18) material indicates, the disclosed depths of evil have a universal scope, as the deeds of
both Jew and Greek derive from the father of lies, a murderer
from the beginning. The human inclination to violence, heretofore more or less successfully concealed, is thus brought into the
open as the source of human blindness and of the rejection of
Jesus. 38
But a more positive dimension is also present and even predominant. Since the exposure of hidden human passions deprives the scapegoat mechanism of its efficacy, a new and
different way of promoting human unity is needed. The principle of non-resistance to evil (cf. Matt 5: 39-41; Luke 6: 27-29;
Rom 12: 17-21; lThess 5: 15; lPet 8: 9), represented most fundamentally in esus's own conduct in the face of persecution,
breaks the universal pattern of mimetic violence in the only
possible way. In addition, the promise of participation in divine
life and the presentation of the infinite God as object of human
striving and standard of human conduct has the important
effect of precluding rivalry, the inevitable result of competitive
pursuit of a finite good. In the same context, the distinction
between imitation and discipleship acquires systematic significance, for discipleship, unlike mimesis, is not productive of
conflict. Jesus's public life may thus be
as an intense effort
to gather a new community-an attempt based, in contrast to
the scapegoat mechanism, on the peace of the kingdom of God
(cf. e.g. Matt 28: 87; Luke 13: 84) ,39
""Ibid., pp. 15!?-17!?; Glaube, pp. 140,
•• Sundenbock, pp.

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JOHN P. GALVIN

But the immediate effect of Jesus's public life differed markedly from his intentions. Instead of achieving a new gathering
of Israel, his conduct brought about a re-dispersion of the people and even provoked a union of his diverse foes, well exemplified in Luke's comments about the new friendship of Herod and
Pilate (Luke 23: Hl). Yet the New Testament (e.g. Acts 4: 2526) goes beyond the empirically evident opposition to Jesus to
posit a universal rejection, based on and illustrative of universal
complicity in human sin. Here Schwager detects a limitation in
the theory of Girard, for whom the choice of a scapegoat is the
irrational and arbitrary result of blind passion. In the New
Testament, hostility to Jesus is not fortuitous; the basic element
provocative of opposition is specifically christological: Jesus's
self-consciousness. The universality of opposition to Jesus is the
result of a deep-seated hostility to God, always disruptive of
authentic human relationships but heretofore successfully concealed. The targeting of Jesus as scapegoat is thus not arbitrary
but" necessary": God allows his son to be made the scapegoat
for human sin. 40
At this point, Schwager is able to advance his theory of redemption. The universality of opposition to Jesus is the necessary precondition which makes possible his death for all. In his
passion, human sin itself (2Cor 5: 21; Gal 3: 13) , not merely
punishment for sin, is universally laid upon and borne by the
holy and innocent one; in this process, which is more than
merely juridical, the darkest depths of human evil come to the
fore. But Jesus's response of non-vengeance (cf. Luke 23: 34),
of acceptance of suffering and death, breaks the cycle of
mimetic violence and the sin of his persecutors does not redound upon its perpetrators. The crucifixion thus has redemptive effects which could not be achieved in any other way, as it
delivers man from the hatred and evil from which he is unable
to free himself. It leads to the new gathering of the people of
God through the pouring out of the Holy Spirit into human
hearts, as a spirit of love which exposes and conquers the oppos••Ibid., pp. 187-205; Glaube, pp. 50-58, 140.

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

185

ing will to death and provides a new, qualitatively different
principle of human unity .41
Schwager finds the most direct biblical support for his soteriology in the interpretation of Jesus as the stone rejected by
the builders but chosen by God as the cornerstone of the entire
structure. This imagery, taken from the psalms (Ps 118: 2223), is applied to Jesus at key places in the synoptic gospels
(Mark 12: 10-11 par), Acts (4: 11) and lPeter (2: 7). Since it
presents a collective act of blind violence as the definitive instrument of revelation, it can function as a summation of the
chief elements of Schwager's adaptation of Girard's theory to
the demands of the New Testament material. 42
Before concluding his treatment of New Testament themes,
Schwager considers two possible sources of objection to his
theory. He finds no contradiction between his thought and the
Pauline theme of the wrath of God, or the apocalyptic material
of the synoptic gospels and Revelation, as he interprets such
texts to refer to divine deliverance of men to the consequences
of their own impulses. 43 Of even more importance is the question of the compatibility of Schwager's thought with the interpretation of Jesus's death as sacrifice in the Pauline Corpus and
in Hebrews. Schwager stresses the contrast Hebrews develops
between Jesus's death and Old Testament rites, and argues that
in exposing the deficiencies of corrupt, violent conceptions of
God, the crucifixion reveals the weakness of ritual sacrifice and
its inability to accomplish its aim of breaking conflict. Christ's
deed can still be grasped as sacrifice, but only if the concept of
sacrifice is thoroughly re-defined to mean self-offering; in this
case, care must always be taken to preclude any implication or
inference of masochism. 44
"Siindenbock, pp. 209-U8, 225-281.
' 9 Ibid., pp. 144-152.
••Ibid., pp. 219-224; Glaube, pp. 152-158. The chief support for this explanation
lies in Rom 1:24-28.
"Siindenbock, pp. 205-209; Glaube, pp. 152, 178 n.99. For a similar position,
cf. the remarks of Karl Rahner, Foundations, pp. 282-288.

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JOHN P. GALVIN

Later Tradition
While the presentation of soteriology in Sundenbock is restricted almost completely to biblical material, its author has sought
in subsequent essays to begin consideration of major figures and
ideas in the history of Christian thought on redemption. Studies
of Irenaeus of Lyon, Anselm ·of Canterbury and the theme of
the victory of Christ over the devil have already appeared and
further work is planned, as Schwager attempts to support the
thesis that his theory is not merely the latest in a long line of
soteriological conceptions, but an approach of permanent value
which does justice to the central intentions of other views.
Schwager's analysis of the soteriology of Irenaeus occurs
against the background of the issues raised by Marcion, whose
perception of diversity within the Bible and concentration on
the Pauline theme of justification led to a denial of the unity of
the two testaments and to the positing of an opposition between
the Creator-God of the Old Testament and the Redeemer-God
of the New. In valid opposition to this, Irenaeus insisted upon
an understanding of God as the universally comprehensive
reality, and defended the unity of the two testaments as manifestations of a complex economy of salvation in which the divine pedagogue takes into account humanity's youth and consequent need for gradual development. For Irenaeus, the justice
and mercy of God are compatible rather than contradictory, as
mercy is exhibited already in the Old Testament and justice
continues to be manifest in the New. Dominant in Irenaeus's
understanding of redemption is the idea of education, though
the crucifixion is recognized as more' than a mere example for
subsequent imitation.
While agreeing fundamentally with Irenaeus's position on the
principle of totality and on the unity of the scriptures, Schwager
finds several points of his theology vulnerable to criticism. The
analysis of divine justice and mercy fails to address certain elements of Marcion's critique, such as the absence of justice in
some Old Testament portrayals of Yahweh (cf. e.g. Ezek U:l5) . The soteriology lacks a clear and explicit development of a

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JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

theology of the cross, and is therefore deficient in addressing the
problem of justification. Finally, as modern exegetical research
has re-emphasized, the principle of the unity of the two testaments requires more careful elaboration than Irenaeus provides,
if the appearance of eclecticism is to be removed from the manner in which the New Testament and subsequent Christian
theology draw on the Old; while interpretations of individual
passages can legitimrutely be supported by reference to a total
view, the total view itself, as one of many possibilities, is in need
of explicit and methodical defense.
In Schwager's judgment, his adaptation of Girard's theory
offers a perspective from which these problems may be successfully addressed. Here the Old Testament texts are seen as an
amalgam, in varying proportions, of sacral projections and di·
vine revelation-which accounts for the variety of their conceptions of God. At the same time, a principle for discernment
among these conceptions is also provided; the texts which reflect
God's support for the righteous sufferer and suffering servantprecisely the chief texts to which the New Testament alludesare the ones which reflect criticism of violence and genuine
revelation of God. This critical basis makes possible a modern
renewal of Irenaeus's typological exegesis, as it is able to safeguard the unity of the two testaments while affording a coherent
explanation for the diversity of biblical conceptions of God. By
expanding the notion of recapitulation to include the idea of the
recapitulation of all human sin in the fate of Jesus (cf. !Pet
2: 24), it becomes possible to construct an explicit theologia
crucis, for Jesus's death is placed at the center of revelation. A
more comprehensive mediation of divine justice and mercy is
also adumbrated. 45
Though to a lesser extent, Schwager has also compared his
soteriology to the thought of Anselm of Canterbury, whose
theory of satisfaction has exercised a decisive influence on Western theology. In Siindenbock, Schwager is relatively reserved
1

•• " Der Gott des Alten Testaments und der Gott des Gekreuzigten: Eine
Untersuchung zur Er!Osungslehre bei Markion und Irenaus," ZKT
(1980)

188

JOHN P. GALVIN

about Anselm's contribution. In addition to criticizing popular
versions of the theory of satisfaction as incompatible with central New Testament assertions about the mercy of God, Schwager also rejects a principle upon which Anselm's argument
rests, as he insists that instead of envisioning human dignity as
requiring that man himself restore the order disturbed by his
sin, one should develop a different conception of human dignity,
which would see such dignity preserved precisely when man is
enabled to pardon others as he himself has been pardoned-in
pure love. 46 In a more recent essay, Schwager seems more sympathetic to the basic outline of Anselm's thought, as he refers
favorably to Anselm's position on the inability of man, apart
from Christ, to perform what he must do to restore the order
violated by sin. Yet one major criticism is still advanced. Despite insistence that restitution must be made by the offending
party, Anselm fails to explain how Christ's free act of satisfaction can become in the full sense a free, personal act of others.
The absence of this dimension, which Schwager would place
under the rubric "Holy Spirit," gives Anselm's theory a tendency toward reification of freedom into a doctrine of merit&
won by Christ-a deformation which Schwager finds widespread in Western tradition and for which he holds Anselm
partially responsible. In these respects, Schwager judges his
own proposal more faithful to the entire biblical record.u
Schwager's latest essay is devoted to exposition and critique
of r general theme from patristic literature rather than the work
of a particular author: the victory of Christ over the devil. He
considers three aspects of the motif (the descent into hell, the
deception of the devil, and the idea of divine payment of a just
ransom), and finds that while each exercised a certain influence
on theological writing and popular piety, specific conceptions
varied widely. Schwager judges the latter two aspects theologically untenable, as he insists on exduding any attribution of
deceit to God and joins Gregory N azianren and Anselm in rejecting any conception of the devil's rights over man. Nonethe•• Siindenbock, pp. !U0-211.
und Erliisungslehre," ZKT 102 (1980) 15-17.

• 7 "Geschichtsphilosophie

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

189

less, he wonders if a kernel of truth cannot be extracted from an
idea so prevalent in Christian tradition, despite some aberrant
elements and much extravagent imagery.
Since the Scriptures say relatively little directly about the
defeat of Satan, specifically by ithe cross, despite the frequency
of references to the devil's activity, Schwager tentatively suggests the possibility of extending the theme of Satan's nature
as deceiver to include deception about his own autonomous existence. The New Testament, especially bhe gospel of John,
depicts Jesus as unjustly condemned for what in reality ruled
the hearts of his persecutors: a collective "satanical" effort,
hidden deep within the hearts of men, to usurp the place of God.
While a display of power in response would have been useless,
this fundamental evil could be and was overcome through the
cross; only such a decisive eX'ternal confrontation could expose
the full perversity of the blasphemous forces opposed to Jesus
and thus defeat them. In this sense, to speak Christ's victory
over the devil on the cross is justified.
Schwager argues that this approach makes sense of much of
the patristic teaching, as it accounts for the conception of a
descensus and envisions self-deception of the satanic will. Only
the theme of a just ransom paid to Satan yields no acceptable
meaning; and even here the way is open for further consideration of the mystery of the Incarnation from bhe perspective of
divine justice. In view of the inclination of the later church to
be more alert to individual evils than to collective self-deceptions, and especially in consideration of the increased potential
for harm which "demonic" self-deception possesses in modern
technological society, explicit recognition of the Christian exposure of its perversity acquires heightened significance.48

Further Perspectives
The soteriological conception thus far presented by Raymund
Schwager is clearly envisioned by its author as an element of
an even more comprehensive theological program. Siindenbock
•• " Der Sieg Christi liber Teufel: Zur Geschichte der Erliisungslehre," ZKT
lOIJ (1981) 156-177.

190

JOHN P. GALVIN

itself suggests by way of conclusion that its soteriological considerations require and pave the way for complementation
through a theology of the Trinity and an 1ecclesiology;a theology of the word as the decisive agent in the overcoming of
violence is also envisioned. 49
While these projects remain for the future, Schwager has already attempted to relate his work to contemporary reconsideration of the problematic of the Enlightenment. Following to a
certain extent the analyses of Odo Marquard, 50 but distancing
himself from Marquard's conclusion, he suggests that the Enlightenment's dethronement of God as the subject of history has
intensified the problem of human responsibility and guilt and
led inexorably to a massive effort to exculpate oneself through
projection of guilt onto others. While the social contract theory
of the origin of human societies implies a mythical idealization
of the past, the Enlightenment's critique of sacral conceptionsitself heavily indebted to the historical influence of Christianity
-has served to bring into sharper focus the deficiencies of the
scapegoat mechanism, which can no longer function with full
efficacy when its covert presuppositions are disclosed. The
urgency of the contemporary situation, in which the continued
quest for scapegoats can easily have catastrophic consequences,
underlines ever more emphatically the need for Christianity, in
which the search for a scapegoat is abandoned in favor of confession of guilt and profession of faith in the mercy of God. And
even if the influence of Christian faith should not prove sufficient to avert global disaster, there would still remain as a last,
permanently indestructible hope the Christian vision of eschatological salvation-" as if through fire" (lCor 8: 15) ,51

III
While the theme of scapegoat has. hardly been a major point
of reference in recent soteriological discussion, 52 the writings of
•• Siindenbock, pp. 233-289.
•• Schwierigkeiten mit der Geschichtsphilosophie (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1973) .
51 "Geschichtsphilosophie,"
pp. 14-28.
•• Cf. the critical observations of Dorothee Solle, for whom the concept of
scapegoat, unlike many other elements of the Old Testament, fails to rise above a

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

191

Schwager have received considerable attention, especially from
other German-language theologians. Some of the response has
been quite positive. Rudolf Pesch, professor of New Testament
at Freiburg im Breisgau, has termed Schwager's work extraordinarily fruitful and applied certain aspects of it to his own
exegetical treatment of Jesus's death. 53 Herwig Biichele, director of the Catholic Social Academy of Austria and, like
Schwager, professor at Innsbruck (social ethics), numbers
Siindenbock among the m'Ost interesting recent theological literature, as he echoes the judgment that adaptation of Girard's
theory provides a useful framework for interpreting the scriptures; as might be expected, Biichele stresses the practical-political implications of Schwager's conception. 54 F. J. Stendebach,
while expressing reservations about some details of the work,
considers the book " one of the most important theological publications of recent years." 55
Other commentators are more circumspect in their judgment.
Another colleague of Schwager's at Innsbruck, the fundamental
theologian Walter Kern, who had reviewed two of Schwager's
earlier works in glowing terms, makes only a rather neutral
passing reference to Siindenbock in the course of a brief discussion of Girard. 56 Othmar K,eel, Old Testament professor at Fribourg, is quite critical of Schwager's use of Old Testament
material. Keel finds that individual texts and passages are
forced into the predetermined framework of Girard's theory, in
a manner reminiscent of past dogmatic searches for dicta probantia; at most these passages illustrate certain elements of
Schwager's conception. In addition, the approach fails to account for other parts of the Old Testament, such as some comphysical understanding of sin and a magical conception of its removal (Christ the
Representative: An Essay in Theology after the " Death of God " [Philadelphia:
Fortress, 1967], pp. 64-65) .
5 • Das Abendmahl
und Jesu Todesverstandnis (Freiburg: Herder, 1978), pp.
106, Hi4-125.
•• " Gewalt und Erlosung: Systematische Bemerkungen zum Buch von R
Schwager, 'Brauchen wir einen Slindenbock? '," ZKT
(1980) fW6-!U6.
••Cf. Stendebach's review of Sundenbock in BK 35 (1980) 76.
••Cf. ZKT 99 (1977) 94-98, and Disput um Jesus und um Kirche (Innsbruck:
Tyrolia, 1988), p.
n.rns.

JOHN P. GALVIN

ponents of the Old Testament conception of God and certain
types of Old Testament sacrifice, so that the theory is at best
incomplete. Nonetheless, Keel does consider the work to be of
value, and suggests that Schwager's interpretation of the New
Testament may be more satisfactory than his judgment of the
Old, because of the unambiguous centrality of the one figure of
Jesus in the New Testament texts. 57
The most extensive and also the most critical evaluation of
Schwager's work comes from the pen of Hans Urs von Balthasar, with whose theology Schwager considers his own
thought to have affinities. 58 While conceding that Schwager's
effort to show that God himself is the one constantly rejected
by man presupposes the existence of a " natural " human relationship to God and therefore (unlike Girard) avoids the
charge that religion is derived completely from human guilt,
von Balthasar finds grounds to oppose major elements of Schwager's soteriology. His most serious objection is the argument
that Schwager's account of Jesus's representation of man as a
result of human transferral of sin to a scapegoat modifies the
realism of the New Testament's conception of Jesus's bearing of
human sin and guilt as an event between him and God the
Father, rather than as a result of his acceptance of sins laid
upon him by men; von Balthasar, whose initial suspicions seem
to have been awakened by Schwager's preference for terminology of psychological derivation, draws attention to QCor 5: QI
("For our sake he [God] made him to be sin who knew no
sin"), and wonders how humanity would have been able to
accomplish a real transferral of such magnitude. Further reservations concern the attenuation of the biblical concept of the
wrath of God, the reduction of the entire structure of sin to
the scapegoat situation, and the fear that conceptions of this
sort exhibit a tendency toward a pen_al theory of Christ's representation.59
Orientierung 42 (1978), 43-46. In his review of
• 7 " Wie hose ist Gewalt,"
Sundenbock, Johannes B. Bauer (TRev 74 [1978) 383-384) expresses his agreement
with Keel's assessment.
58 " Der Gott des Alten Testaments,"
p. 289; " Der Sieg Jesu," p. 176.
59 Theodramatik
3, pp. 288-291; "Crucifixus etiam pro nobis," p. 30; "Die

JESUS AS SCAPEGOAT?

198

Yet, for von Balthasar, the approaches of Girard and Schwager retain a certain value. Von Balthasar divides modern
approaches to soteriology inrto two categories: a model which
places Jesus's solidarity with the human race in the foreground
and orients itself chiefly on his humanity and his active life, and
a model which concentrates on the theme of substitution, with
stress on the divine depths of Jesus's person and primary focus
on the cross. Seeking to draw these often divergent approaches
into a synthesis, and classifying both Girard and Schwager
among the more significant representatives of the second type,
he sees their work, however deficient, as leading helpfully to
the threshold of the central aspects of the drama of redemption.60

IV
While a final evaluation of Schwager's soteriology is hardly
possible at this stage of its development, some preliminary reflections on its content may well be appropriate.
Certain aspects of Schwager's work can only be greeted with
warm praise. His analysis of the Bible succeeds in accenting
some dimensions of the scriptures (the theme of violence, especially in the Old Testament; Johannine soteriology and christology) which are often neglected by contemporary theologians.
The effort to address the problem of evil as a central concern
of theology is also quite welcome. For a more directly christological perspective, the scapegoat theory has the advantages of
identifying a unifying soteriological factor through its focus on
Jesus's death, as it provides clear reasons for viewing the crucifixion in conjunction with and as the culmination of his public
life, and of detecting the positive value of that death, rather
than assessing it in terms of failure or defeat. Finally, the
theory has the evident strength of envisioning a basic unity of
dogmatics and ethics, 61 and of embracing .in an organic whole
neue Theorie von Jesus als dem ' Siindenbock,' " lnte1'1lationale katholische Zeitschrift "Communio" 9 (1980) 184-185.
60 Theodramatik S, pp. 245-291.
61 For an example cf. Raymund Schwager, "lnkonsequente
Normfindung fiir
Gewalt und Ehescheidung,'' Orientierung 44 (1980) 144-147, though details of
the argument might be questioned,

194

JOHN P. GALVIN

both the social-political and the individual aspects of Jesus's
preaching and fate and of the Christian life of faith.
Problems do, however, remain. Schwager has recognized that
his theory should be evaluated by testing its ability to account
satisfactorily for all pertinent material. Seen from this perspective, his repeated claims to have provided a definitive and comprehensive explanation of the question of salvation-as distinguished from the more modest goal of offering new illumination
of certain aspects of the problem-is clearly an exaggeration, as
the selectivity of his biblical references shows. (It is instructive
to note that similar changes of selectivity and of exaggerated
claims to comprehensive explana:tion have also been raised by
critics of Girard's work.62 ) The nearly exclusive concentration
on the problem of violence and the orientation of the definition
of the sacred on the thought of Rudolf Otto may also be questioned. Finally, the complex theme of sacrifice requires more
thorough examination than Schwager has thus far provided,
particularly with regard to the application of sacrificial vocabulary in the interpretation of Jesus's crucifixion.
Nonetheless, despite such weaknesses, Schwager's thought
provides an imaginative and substantial contribution to the
current discussion of the theology of the cross.63
JOHN P. GALVIN

St. John's Seminary
Boston, Massachusetts
• 2 Cf. Hayden White, " Ethnological ' Lie ' and Mythical ' Truth,' " Diacritic1
8: 1 (Spring 1978) 2-9, and the reviews of Violence and the Sacred by Ninian
Smart (RSR 6 [1980] 178-177) and in the Times Literary Supplement (5 October
1978)' p. 1192.
•• Since completion of this article, Schwager has published " Fluch und Sterbliehkeit-Opfer und Unsterblichkeit: Zur Erlosungslehre des Athanasius " (ZKT 108
[1981] 877-899) and "Der wunderbare Tausch: Zur 'physischen' Erlosungslehre
Gregon; von Nyssa" (ZKT 104 [1982] 1-24). Essays on Augustine, M1tximus
Confessor and Jesus's judgment discourses are forthcoming. The proceedings of a
convention dedicated to Old Testament aspects of the theory, held at Zozen in the
fall of 1981, will appear with a response by Schwager in the Quaestiones Diaputatae
series. For information regarding these publications I am indebted to Dr. J6zef
Niewiadomski, Innsbruck,

AQUINAS'S REGI1l!EN BENE COMMIXTUM
AND THE MEDIEVAL CRITIQUE
OF CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM *

R

OUSSEAU FOR ONCE enters the mainstream of western republicanism in proclaiming the Roman Republic
" the model for all free peoples." 1 The notion that the
classical Roman mixed regime constituted the most outstanding
historical example of the well-ordered polity pervaded republican thought from Polybius to the 18th century. 2 Indeed, al* Earlier versions of this paper were presented before the American Catholic
Historical Association, April, 1980, ltlld the Missouri Conference on History, April,
1980. The authors thank Professors Theta Moehs and Everett Wheeler, for their
cogent sugge3tions and comments.
1 J. J. Rousseau, " Dedication " to Th!f Second Discourse, in C. M. Sherover,
translator, The Social Contract plus The Dedication from The Second Discourse
and On Political Economy (New York: American Library, 1974), p. 243. Rousseau's exalted praise of Rome in this context is striking since a goal of the
"Dedication" is to flatter the citizens of Geneva. Yet, although he praises
the republic of Geneva in the " Dedication," such praise does not approach the
superlatives used in his assessment of Rome.
2 For a general overview of the scholarship on the theory of the mixed regime,
see: Kurt Von Fritz, The Theory of the Mixed Constitution in Antiquity (New
York: Columbia University Press, 1954); Zera Fink, The Classical Republicans
(Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1945); Malcolm Sharp, "The Classical
American Doctrine of the Separation of Powers," University of Chicago Law
Review, II (April, 1935), 385-436; Gilbert Chinard, " Polybius and the American
Constitution," Journal of the History of Ideas, I (January, 1940) 38-58; Yung Chi
Hoe, The Origins of Parliamentary Sovereignty (Shanghai: The Commercial Press,
1933); Otto Gierke, Political Theories of the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1900); Roy Lokken, "The Concept of Democracy in Colonial
Political Thought," William and Mary Quarterly, 16 (October, 1959), 568-580; J. R.
Pole, "Historians and the Problem of Early American Democracy," American
Historical Review, 67 (April, 1962), 626-646; J. W. Allen, A History of Political
Thought in the Sixteenth Century (New York: Dial Press, 1928); George Sabine,
A History of Political Theory (New York: Holt, 1950), William Dunning, A
History of Political Theories Ancient and Medieval (New York: Macmillan,
1930); Stanley Pargellis, "The Theory of Balanced Government," in Conyers
Read, ed., The Constitution Reconsidered (New York: Columbia University

195

196

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

though they deliberately sought to improve upon the Roman
model, Italian Renaissance and Anglo-American political
theorists still fused a veneration for the Roman regime to modern republican consciousness. 3 In short, Rome stands as the
eternal city for republicans as well as Christians.
Given the stature of its proponents, as well as the central
Press, 1938), pp. 33-46; Edward Corwin, Court Over Constitution (Princeton;
Princeton University Press, 1938); W. B. Gwyn, The Meaning of the Separation of
Powt:rs (New Orleans: Tulane University Press, 1965); Corinne Weston, English
Constitutional Theory and the House of Lords, 1556-1832 (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1965); M. J. C. Vile, Constitutionalism and the Separation of
Powt:rs (Oxford: Clarendon University Press, 1967); Stanley N. Katz, "The
Origins of American Constitutional Thought," in Perspectives in American History,
1967, Vol. III (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968), pp. 474-490; Paul
Eidelberg, The Philosophy of the American Constitution (New York: The Free
Press, 1968) and Discourse on Statesmanship (Chicago: University of Illinois
Press, 1974); Gordon Wood, The Creation of the American Republic, 17761787 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1969); F. W. Walbank,
Polybius (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972); Paul Conkin, SelfEvident Truths (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1974); Henry Steele
Commager, The Empire of Reason (New York: Anchor Books, 1977); J. G. A.
Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975);
C. C. Huffman, 'Coriolanus' in Context (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press,
1972); Michael Mendie, " Mixed Government, The Estates, and the Bishops,"
unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Washington University, 1977; Martin Diamond,
" The Separation of Powers and the Mixed Regime," Publius, VII (Summer, 1978),
85-43.
• The severing of the classical Roman tradition from modern republican political
thought was not accomplished until the mid-nineteenth century. Although thP
English and American tradition of viewing their regimes strictly through Roman
lenses was brought to its end by the separate efforts of Bagehot and Lincoln
during the 1860's, the Roman Republican theories received their most telling blow
from Marx. Operating under a novel historical perspective, Marx sought through
one bold and masterful stroke to sever modern political consciousness from its
classical roots. Envisioning the Roman Republican tradition as " a nightmare
on the brain of the living," Marx viewed these time-honored teachings as
bourgeois society's attempts to escape from the reality of the class struggle and
infuse a mock heroism into its debased political existence. On Bagehot's severing
the English constitution from the theory ef the mixed regime, see Weston,
English Constitutional Theory, pp. 217-257, and on Lincoln's attempt at a new
founding of the American Republic, see Harry Jaffa, Crisis of the House Divided
(New York: Doubleday, 1958), pp. 308-346. On Marx. see Karl Marx. "The
Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte," in Institute of Marxism and Leninism,
ed., Karl Marx and Fredmick Engels: Selected Works, I (Moscow, 1969), pp.
898-399.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

197

position it occupies in Western political thought, one might
expect that the Roman republican tradition offers little that
is new to scholarship. 4 Consequently, one might assume that
scholarship on that tradition is now confined either to unearthing hitherto obscure theorists or to offering a novel perspective
on a major thinker. The following examination of St. Thomas
Aquinas's regimen bene commixtum thus confronts a paradox.
For in the same measure that he is regarded as a major theorist
of government, he is considered a lesser theorist of the mixed regime.5 This paper will argue, however, that the Thomistic view
of the properly mixed regime is both a contribution to the
Medieval development of republican theory and a significant
criticism of his classical predecessors. Because the classical tradition directly shaped the contours of modem republican
thought, it is as a critic that Thomas offers an enduring contribution to republican theory.
Since Thomas's regimen bene commixtum is presented as a
critique of classical republicanism, it presupposes familiarity
with that tradition. 6 A brief discussion of methopology, as well
as an historical synopsis of the leading pre-Thomistic republican philosophers, is thus a necessary prelude to an analysis of
Thomas's own ideas on the mixed regime. Only after this material has been presented will the paper advance to a theoretical
appraisal of the proper republican order contained in the Summa Theologiae.
Few concepts in the lexicon of Western politics evade precise
• This especially would appear to be true given scholarly reaction to the
pathbreaking studies of Robert Cumming, Human Nature and History, I
(Chicago; University of Chicago Press, 1969), Gordon Wood, Creation of the
American Republic, and J. G. A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Movement.
5 The only students of the mixed regime in Western political philosophy who
include Thomas among the major theorists of the construct are Paul Conkin,
Self-Evident Truths, p. 118 and Dante Germino, Modern _Western Political, Thought
p. 48.
(Chicago: Rand McNally,
"For brief treatments of the parameters of classical republicanism, see especially,
Fink, The Classical Republicans; Wood, The Creation of the American Republic;
and Mark Gavre, " The Demise of Classical Republicanism During the American
Revolution," unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, UCLA, 1978.

198

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

definition as readily as republicanism. 7 In large part, this is due
to the use of certain structural categories such as constitution,
government, state, and society, which are incorporated into the
modern definitions of republicanism. Such categories, however,
presuppose a perspective alien to classical politics in general
and to classical republicanism in particular. 8 For this reason
(to say nothing of the focal point of the regimen bene oommixtum) the term" regime" is most appropriate as the categorical
genus under which the various species of republicanism should
be examined.
Regime is the best translation of the Greek, politeia. According to most classical sources, politeia encompasses diverse components such as the relation of a citizen to a polis, the life of a
citizen, the condition of a community, and constitution. 9 Unlike the concepts of government and constitution, regime thus
consists of far more than the institutional arrangements of a
society. Although regime assumes a given governmental structure as the necessary condition for a community, it also addresses the sufficient conditions for the sake of which the
community exists. Regime determines the norms and values
which are but reflected in governmental structure and which,
in turn, are transmitted to the citizens. In its broadest sense,
regime impresses upon society what Whitehead called the " defining characteristic " by acting upon the citizen as " form does
to matter." 10 The regime, in effect, gives order to a community
7 For an interesting discussion of the various theories of republicanism proposed
by scholars since 1945, see Robert Shalhope, " Toward a Republican Synthesis:
Emergence of Understanding of Republicanism in American Historiography,"
William and Mary Quarterly, xxix (October, 1979), 40-74.
8 See especially Harry V. Jaffa, "Aristotle"
in Leo Strauss and Joseph Cropsey,
eds., History of Political Philosophy (Chicago: Rand McNally Press, 1972), pp.
66-67.
•These are among the definitions found in Lidell and Scott's Greek dictionary.
See also Herodotus, The Persian Wars, IX, 34; Xenophon, Memorabilia, III IX;
15; Aristotle, Politics, 1292a, 1289a, 1279b. Politeia is in essence the life of a
polis. For an examination of the idea of the polis, see Harry V. Jaffa, "Natural
Right," in David Sills, ed., International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciencea
(New York: 1968), p. 87.
10 Alfred North Whitehead, Adventures of Ideas (New York: 1933), pp. 204-!l08.
The discussion of regime presented in this paper draws heavily on the work of

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

199

and thus establishes the character of that community. In this
sense, regime transcends the contemporary distinction between
state and society, a distinction grounded in the view that society determines the character of the state. 11 Encompassing
what is now referred to as state and society, regime is the very
" soul of the community." 12 As such, it provides for the community what the soul provides for the individual: it orders the
community's political and social structure and determines the
ends which these means shall serve.
Regime also pre-dates or perhaps transcends the fact-value
dichotomy. For its descriptive connotation as the "soul of the
community" necessarily lends it a normative meaning. A regime
must take into account the whole which it orders. In short,
regime compels one to consider both the ends as well as means
of communal life.13 And, Hobbes and modern social science notHarry V. Jaffa, "Natural Right," in David Sills, ed., International Encyclopedia
of The Social Sciences, and "Aristotle" in History of Political Philosophy,
pp. 439-40.
11 This view pervades modern political science.
It is implicit in the " state of
nature " arguments of Hobbes and Locke.
Indeed, the "state of nature "
argument requires a pre-political social condition.
This is, in contemporary
scholarship for example, the thesis of John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1971), see especially pp. 11 ff. In political science this
view is perhaps best reflected in Robert Dahl, Modern Political Analysis (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1963), pp. 4-14.
12 Aristotle, Politics, rnsob.
Bloom, The Republic of Plato, refers to the regime
as "the soul of the city," p. 440. The same idea, albeit without the classical (or
theological) reference to soul, emerges in David Easton's Systems Analysis of
Political Life (New York: 1965) pp. 191-194. Lincoln's image of the relationship
between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as the " apple of
gold in a frame of silver " reflects this notion of regime. Lincoln continues by
stating that the frame was made for the apple and dictated by the nature of
the apple, Abraham Lincoln His Speeches and Writing, edited by Roy Basler
(New York: 196Q), p. 513. For an application of this notion of regime to
Thomistic political thought see, Dante Bigongiari, "Introduction," in The Political
Ideas of St. Thomas Aquinas (New York: Hafner Press, 1953), pp. xxiv, n.4.
For Thomas's own definition of regime, see his Commentary on the Politics of
Aristotle, III, 1, Q and 6.
13 Bloom, op. cit. pp. 439-440.
This view of regime is reflected in Aristotle's
typology of regimes, a typology which addresses both the means and ends of
politics, Politics, IQ78 b, ff.

!l00

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

withstanding, ends cannot be factual in the sense in which fact
is now understood. 14
A regime, then, is a regime largely because of the presence of
a ruling or ordering principle which looks to the good of the
whole. Regimes (and thus communities) differ from each other
because of the variety of ordering principles or the different
opinions regarding the human and political goods. Reflecting
both the normative and descriptive notion of regime, the Athenian Stranger in Plato's Laws remarks that, " certain polities we
of course deny to be regimes ... where laws are enacted in the
interest of a part [of the community], we call them factious
polities rather than regimes." 15 But the Laws focusses on another polity in which the regime appears to be either very well
concealed or non-existent. The Stranger's interlocutors contend
that the polities of which they are citizens, Sparta and Crete,
do not fit the normal categories of regimes.16 The Athenian
Stranger agrees and asserts that those polities partake of a
number of regimes. Given the variety of ruling principles present in Sparta and Crete, at first glance these polities do not
appear to have regimes. But, unlike the factional polities which
he had mentioned earlier, the Athenian Sitranger considers
Sparta and Crete to be well ordered. Although no single regime
" The modern attempt to transform ends into factual data either trivializes ends
or substitutes necessary for sufficient conditions. Hobbes best exemplifies this in
his assertion that the goal of public life is mere preservation. Subsequent efforts
to modify Hobbes's harsh views only succeed in substituting comfortable preservation for mere preservation. For a more extended discussion of this development see
Hans Jonas, The Phenomenon of Life: Toward a Philosophical Biology (New
York: Harper and Row, 1966), pp. 64-92, 282-284; Leo Strauss, What is Political
Philosophy? And Other Studies (Glencoe, Illinois: The Free Press of Glencoe,
1959); Eric Voegelin, The New Science of Politics (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1952), pp. 1-26.
'"Plato, Laws, 715b. The term, rendered here as "factious polity", used by the
Stranger is stasioteias which means faction or partisan or conspirator. It connotes
a part of the whole opposed to the whole much as does Publius's use of faction in
Federalist 10. The idea here should be compal'ed with the Republic, 577d-e, where
democracy is not considered a single regime, but many. In this dialogue, Socrates
asserts that democracy " contains all species of regimes." See also Aristotle,
Politics, 1266a.
16 Plato, Laws, 712 E.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL RlilPUBLICANISM

predominates, these polities do indeed have an ordering principle. That principle consists in the specific mixture of various
principles. The mixed regime first emerges in Western political
thought as a good polity in which no single ordering principle
prevails.
Generalizing from the ideas developed by Plato and Aristotle,
as well as those propounded by Roman theorists of the mixed
regime, four distinct types of mixed regimes emerge from classical antiquity. The first, or high mixture, seeks to balance the
virtues associated with the various elements of society against
the corresponding vices, with the aim of promoting the virtues.
Such a regime aims higher than political justice and seeks as
well the perfection of the individual citizen. The siecond,or low
mixture, strives to balance the various interests represented by
the inevitable reduction of a society into the rich and the poor
This mixture attempts to cancel out the rule of the poor in their
own interest-what Aristotle calls democracy-and the rule of
the rich in their own interest-oligarchy. Such a mixture aims
at the good of the polity by seeking to assure that no single
class interest predominates. At its best, this regime cancels out
or balances vices rather than directly promoting virtue. 17 Thus,
although its impact upon individual citizens is neither as farreaching nor as grandiose as that intended by the high mixture,
this regime also seeks to influence individuals as well as governments. The third mixture attempts neither to promote virtue
nor to cancel out vices. Instead, this mixture is based upon the
idea that a good regime must mix and thus balance the functions of government. Consequently, the governmental functions
tend to be separated and represent either different elements of
society or different regime forms. Such a regime works directly
upon government and has only an indirect influence upon individual citizens. Implicit in this regime is the notion that
governmental structure rather than individuals must be affected
directly by the regime. Finally, the fourth mixture is a blend
17 Exemplifying
this is Aristotle's praise of polity
excesses (vices) of democracy and oligarchy.

which cancels out

the

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

of the other three. Seeking at times to have a direct impact
upon the citizen, it emulates the first two mixtures; seeking at
other times to influence only governmental institutions, it
emulates the third mixture.
Added to each of these four genera of mixed regimes are
numerous species of mixtures. For the types are silent with
respect to which element shall rule in each mixture or how the
institutions shall be ordered, to say nothing of which element
in society shall be represented and, if represented, where represented. To get a clearer view of those specific mixtures which
Thomas could have known and which, as a consequence, may
have influenced him, we shall now turn toward the predominant
mixtures advanced in classical antiquity.
Although Plato's Laws contains the first extended theoretical
discussion of the mixed vegime, the notion that a good polity
must balance, and hence mix, various elements is first articulated in the Republic. 18 Two features of a mixed regime emerge
in the Republic. First, although Socrates creates a philosophic
monarchy in the dialogue, the aim of that monarchy is to assure the proper mixture of the elements of the polity. Those
elements are seen as similar to the three elements of the soul.
Consequently, the aim of the Republic's monarchy, but certainly not the means by which it achieves that aim, is a properly balanced mixture in the polity. What makes this mixture
one which can have its being only in speech is the requirement
that each element of the polity be virtuous. 19 Its impossibility
aside, the regime of the Republic indicates what elements in society must be taken into account and how those elements must
be mixed. Second, the Republic connects justice and moderation. Specifically, justice is described as that virtue which balances the elements within the polity as moderation balances the
elements within the soul. Moderation and justice are cardinal
virtues because each addresses the whole with a view to orderCumming, Human Nature and History, I, pp. 130 ff.
On the regime of the Republic as one which has its being in speech, see
Leo Strauss, "Plato," in The City and Man (Chicago: Rand McNally: 1964).
18

19

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

208

mg or properly mixing those elements which constitute the
whole.
The founding of a possible city, one which has its being not
only in speeches, is the project of Plato's Laws.20 Here the
Athenian Stranger proposes a different regime from that created
by Socrates in the Republic. 21 According to the Athenian
Stranger, the mixed regime is a possible solution to the dilemma
of promoting virtue and harmony in a citizenry grounded in a
world of natural cataclysms and human frailties. Rejecting
the possibility that either of the two " mother regimes "monarchy or democracy-could •achieve the task, the Stranger
contended that only a proper mixture of both could assure a
stable -and just polity. 22 As a proper consequence, the attempt
to establish all the virtues was abandoned in favor of creating
a regime which promoted only one: temperance or moderation.
The problem with each of the " mother regimes " was that they
tended to dissolve into the worst possible regimes. Using the
Persian monarchy as his
the Athenian Stranger shows
that lack of moderation caused first Cambyses and then Xerxes
20 The distinction between best possible and simply best corresponds to Socrates's
distinction between words and deeds. The polity constructed by Socrates in the
Republic is called the city " that has its place in speeches." Aristotle also
considers the mixed regime the best gov>ernment in fact. Plato, Republic, 592b;
Aristotle, Politics, 1295a. It shonld be pointed out that in examining classical and
Thomistic theories of the mixed regime, ref.erence to the political institutions of
historical antiquity will be made. We are, however, not concerned with an
historical examination of what these institutions in fact were, but as they were
envisioned by theorists to be-oftentimes two quite distinct entities. The regimes
to be examined, thus, are considered of a genre akin to Socrates's city in speech.
According to F. W. Walbank, "the first reference to a mixture of political
abstraction" by Plato appears in the Menexenus. There is little doubt that
Socrates, in this early Platonic dialogue, indirectly praises the Athenian regime
when it was composed of an aristocracy t·empered by democracy. However, in the
Menexenus, it is clear that for Plato such a regime by dint of placing all virtual
power in the hands of a limited elite proves " in very truth an aristocracy " and
not a mixed regime. Walbank, Polybius, p. IS5; Plato, Menexenus, 288c-S.
21 While the Stranger's
proposed regime in the Laws is different from that
of Socrates's it is not altogether different. In certain decisive respects, the aims
of the two regimes are similar. See Leo Strauss, " Plato," in Strauss and Cropsey,
eds., Hi.story of Political Philosophy, p. 61.
22 Plato, Laws, 69Sd.

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JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

to become tyrants. Turning to Athens, he indicates that the
excessive freedom of the Athenians transformed Athens into an
anarchy. The cure for Athens as well as Persia is moderation.
The Laws echoes the Republic in stressing the need for proper
education as the means whereby moderation is impressed upon
the citizens. In addition, as well as in contradistinction to the
Republic, the Laws supports a specific mixture of regimes to
facilitate moderation. Specifically, a mixture of the two
" mother regimes " is proposed as a remedy for the potential
excesses of each. Although the mixture first appears to blend
monarchical and democmtic regimes, in fact, as Aristotle noted,
the mixture combines oligarchy and democracy. 23 Nonetheless,
this city in deed seeks to promote only one of the virtues and
uses both a mixture of ordering principles and institutions to
accomplish its goal. The Laws thus offers a practical alternative
to the regime of The Republic. The philosopher king, whose
wisdom is constantly required, is replaced by the prudent
founder (the Athenian Stranger), whose task is not the process
of governing, but the establishment of a properly mixed and
balanced regime. In short, the mixed regime was considered
more practical than Socrates's "city in speech" because the
former demands only prudence-and that only at the founding
-whereas the latter demands the unlikely coincidence of political power and philosophy.
The mixed regime was also Aristotle's solution to the political
dilemma of creating a stable polity and a virtuous citizenry. 24
The Aristotelian solution, however, differed slightly from the
Platonic. Operating with more categorical paradigms and with
an even more practical bent, Aristotle contended that the properly mixed regime was the best solution for " average " communities: for nearly all human communities. He sought to mix
the virtues of democ:mcy (rule by the free born who are poor)
and oligarchy (rule by the wealthy) while avoiding the vices
endemic to each. " A properly mixed polity should look as if it
••Aristotle, Politic8, U65b-U66a,
••Ibid., 1£93bff., especially

especially U66a 18-19.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

contained both democratic and oligarchic elements-and as if it
contained neither." 25 Democracy's virtue consisted in the fad
that it represented the greatest number of citizens; its vice was
immoderation. Oligarchy's virtue was frugality; its vice was
that it represented the whole with only a small part. Out of
their mixture, Aristotle sought that " mean " which would
create stability as well as a moderate citizenry.
Both Plato and Aristotle, their differences aside, agreed that
the ethos or character of the regime was reflected in the character or soul of the citizenry. Hence their mixed regimes did
not have the negative task of controlling vice, but the positive
task of promoting virtue. Consequently, each was more concnned with the ethos produced by the mi:x:turethan with institutional arrangements.
The Romanized Greek historian Polybius trans£ erred the notion of the mixed regime from classical Greece to Rome. 26 In
his Histories Polybius offered a new structural model for the
properly mixed regime, and also a novel approach to the subject,
one that would have an enduring influence upon all subsequent
advocates of the construct, including Thomas. 21 Rejecting the
2 • Ibid., 1294b.
••The bulk of Polybius's teachings on the mixed regime are to be found in his
Histories, VI. For a general assessment of the Polybian theory, see Kurt Von
Fritz, Theory of the Mixed Constitution in Antiquity; F. W. Walbank, "Polybius,"
in T. A. Dorey, ed., Latin Historians (New York: Basic Books, 1968), pp. 43-55;
R. D. Cumming, Human Nature and History, I (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1969), pp. 135-174.
27 According to Robert
Cumming, Polybius e>ffered his novel approach to
politics as a grandiose attempt to reconcile the ambiguities of the vision of the
ideal regime contained in Plato's Republic and the Timaeus. In those dialogues,
Socrates advanced two seemingly disparate views on the nature of the ideal
political construct: in the Republic the ideal was intended to exist exclusively
in the theoretical realm of speech, while in the Timaeus Socrates yearned to
transfer the ideal from its ideational and moral context to an actual historical
existence so as better to judge its excellence. As such, the two accounts of the
best political order expose a tension in the Platonic mind regarding the
value of historical existence in the determination of the ideal regime. According
to Cumming, Polybius's Histories was a manifesto for the superiority of historical
analysis over abstract philosophy as the means of determning what is best in
political life. See Cumming, Human Nature and History, I, p. 136, 141-143; Plato,
Republic, 472E; Timaeus, 19b-c; Polybius, Histories, VI, 47.7-10.

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JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

Platonic and Aristotelian abstract mixtures as inferior regimes
because they had not passed the acid test of historical existence,
Polybius based his vision of the ideal mixed regime on the constitution of the Roman Republic. Rome merited the Polybian
accolade primarily because of its institutional structure which,
as the perfect blend of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy,
alone of all regimes could control the vice endemic to all polities
as evidenced by the natural cycle of political degeneration and
revolution.
By grounding his vision of political perfection and stability
in the control of institutional vices rather than the promotion
of civic virtues, Polybius championed the notion of the separation and balance of powers as the key principle in his ideal mixture. As a result, not only was each portion of the Republic's
governing bodies associated with a particular regime form, but
each part also wielded a portion of the actual political power
in the regime. Only through such an elaborate and rigid system
of institutional checks and balances as evidenced in the Roman
Republic could a regime forestall its inevitable degeneration
into a perverted polity. For Polybius, then, the ideal mixed
regime was requfred to enjoy a concrete historical existence,
perfectly blend the three beneficial regime forms so that no element dominated, and control institutional vice through a separation and balance of powers among three equally potent institutions. 28
The theory of the mixed regime contained in the writings of
post-Polybian Roman historians in many ways reflected an at28 See especially his Hist<>riea, VI. On the Polybian theory of the Roman mixed
regime, see Von Fritz, Theory of the Mixed Constitution in Antiquity, pp. Sff.;
Leon Homo, Roman Political Inatitutiona (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1930), pp.
llS-118; T. A. Sinclair, A History of Greek Political, Thought (New York: Meridian
Books, 1968), pp. !'l69-!'l74;F. E. Adcock, Roman Political, Ideas and Practice (Ann
Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Pr., 1959), pp. 44-47; Gilbert Chinard, "Polybius and
the American Constitution," Journal of the History of Ideas, I (January, 1940),
38-59; William Dunning, A History of Political Theories Ancient and Medieval
(New York: Macmillan, 1930), pp. 113-118, Mason Hammond, City-State and
World-State in Greek and Roman Political Theory Until Augustus (Cambridge:
Harvard U. Pr., 1951), pp. 70-80.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

207

tempt to reconcile the conflicting mixtures advanced by the
classical Greeks and Polybius. 29 Like Polybius, Cicero, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and Plutarch sought, and discovered,
their ideal mixture from the annals of history rather than abstract philosophical inquiry. 3 ° For Cicero and Dionysius, the
properly mixed regime was recognized in the constitution of the
Roman Republic, while Plutarch envisioned his ideal in the
Spartan mixture inspired by Lycurgus. 31 Similarly, all three
recognized the institutional system of checks and balances as
a major cause for the Republic's perfection. Unlike Polybius,
however, these later historians apparently recognized that the
Republic's political affairs in reality were dominated by a tightly knit faction that ruled through the Senate. As a result, each
championed a mixture of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy, but replaced Polybius's perfect blend with a regime
where one element, the aristocratic, proved the dominant ruling
force.32
All three historians sought further to improve upon the Polybian mixture by injecting Platonic and Aristotelian categories
into the former's scheme. Thus, for Cicero, a properly balanced
mixture was not one restricted to political institutions or regime
forms, but one which sought to balance the economic interests
of the few and the many in order to promote justice and liberty
in the regime.33 According to Dionysius, the Roman Republic
owed its excellence as a mixed regime not to its natural historical development, as Polybius and Cicero had claimed, but to
the philosophical wisdom of a single lawgiver, Romulus. 34 Only
••On this distinction, see Note !'l7 above.
••Cicero, Republic, II, 52; Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, II,
8, 12, IS, and 14; Plutarch, " Lycurgus," in Lives, V, 6-8.
31 Cicero, Republic, II, 66; Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, II,
7, 11; Plutarch, "Lycurgus," in Lives, V, 6-8,
82 Cicero, Laws, II, 80; III, 24-25, 28, 88; Dionysius_ of Halicarnassus, Roman
Antiquities, II, 14; VI, 66; Plutarch, "Lycurgus," in Lives. V, 6-8.
33 Cicero, Republic, I, 69; II, 57-58, 69.
For an additional treatment of Socratic
ingredients contained in Cicero's vision of the Roman Republic, see Ronald
Lettieri, "Janus Legacy: Roman Theorists of the Mixed Regime," Paper presented
at the Missouri Conference on History, April, 1980.
•• Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, II, 7, 11, and 14.

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JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

when this institutional structure established at Rome's founding was tampered with during the Tribuneship of Gaius Gracchus did the mixture collapse and thrust Rome into civil war.
Plutarch similarly sought to pay homage to the Platonic lawgiver, and by implication to philosophical wisdom, within an
historical context in his version of the ideal mixed regime.35
For Plutarch, Lycurgus proved Sparta's lawgiver when, in his
wisdom, he erected an aristocratic element as a " ballast " between the extremities of democracy and monarchy, thus perfecting the Spartan mixture. 36
The classical legacy of the theory of the mixed regime that
Thomas confronted thus was complex and oftentimes at odds
with itself. 37 Individual distinctions notwithstanding, political
theorists from Plato to Plutarch unfailingly had contended that
only through some form of governmental balance or equilibrium
could a regime be safeguarded from a naturally inspired degeneration into political perversion and tyranny. As such, the
notion of the mixed regime emerged from classical antiquity as
the only practical (historical) alternative to the abstract (Socratic) brand of political absolutism and became venerated as
the core of Roman republican philosophy. It is with such a
••According to Plutarch, the source of Lycurgus's wisdom in establishing a
mixed regime for Sparta was not his political experience but his study of
Greek poetry. Given the Aristotelian chide that poetry by nature was more
philosophical than history, Plutarch, in viewing the poetry of Homer and Thales
as the source of Lycurgus's wisdom, had issued a stern rebuke to the Roman
view of political life. Indeed, so potent was this new source of political sagacity
that Lycurgus sent the poet Thales to Sparta to promQte harmony and
obedience in its citizens through the "
rhythms " and " ordered tranquility" of his lyric verses. Plutarch, Lives, IV, 1-4 and V, 6-8; and Aristotle,
Poetics, 145lb.
36 Plutarch,
" Lycurgus," in Lives, V, 6-8.
37 This is not to say that Thomas was familiar with all the primary
works
cited above. Instead, it merely contends that_ his theory of the mixed regime was
obviously an alternative to the theories that preceded his and, as such, contrasts
sharply with the earlier proposed paradigms. For a brief general discussion of
the availability of classical writings during the Middle Ages, see Medieval
Political, Philosophy: A Sourceboolc (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1963), pp.
16-18.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

Q09

tradition in mind that we now turn to an analysis of the Thomistic teachings concerning the regimen bene commixtum. 38
Thomas approached the subiect of the mixed regime through
the familiar classical Greek path of seeking an alternative to a
regime based solely upon monarchical principles. Despite acknowledging absolute monarchy as the single best theoretical
regime because of its unmatched excellence in promoting unity
and its reflection of the divine rule of the universe, he followed
Plato and Aristotle by dismissing it from consideration as the
best actual regime. 39 For Thomas, the unconditional rule of a
single man, despite its excellence in the abstract, posed the
greatest danger to the promotion of the common good because
it alone of just regimes most easily degenerated into tyranny. 40
38 Our
emphasis upon the relationship between Thomas's teachings on the
mixed regime is in contrast to the approach advanced by D'Entreves for the study
of the subject. According to D'Entreves, " The real meaning and importance of
St. Thomas' teaching on this point [the mixed regime] can clearly only be
assessed by referring to the actual constitutional practices of his times." Although
we believe such an approach to the subject is not only deserving of merit, but
also, of much closer attention, we obviously reject the monolithic pretensions of
D'Entreves's methodology. Instead, we take our general analytical bearings from
Lerner and Mahdi, who have argued: " The medieval political philosophers themselves did not claim to have developed their teaching solely on the basis of direct
reflection upon medieval political life without any regard for earlier conventions
and traditions. The analyses of the political life of their own communities, the
very terms employed, were largely borrowed from classical political philosophy .... If they added to, or modified, or radically changed the framework of
the classical political tradition, it was nonetheless to that tradition that they
first turned .... There is no medieval political philosopher who did not directly
or indirectly make use of the classical tradition in approaching the study of
political things."
D'Entreves, "Introduction,"
in Aquinas: Select Political
Writings, pp. xxix; Lerner and Mahdi, "Introduction," in Medieval Political Philo9ophy, pp. 15-16.
89 On monarchy
as the best theoretical regime, see De Regimine Principum,
I, 2, 5, 6, and 17; Summa Theologiae, I, ciii, 3; Summa Contra Gentiles, IV, 76.
For a discussion of the Thomistic notion of monarchy, see especially, Dino
Bigongiari, "Introduction," in Political Ideas of St. Thomas Aquinas, pp. xxvi-xxix;
Thomas Gilby, The Political Thought of Thomas Aquinas, pp. 287-289, 294; John
Morrall, Political Thought in Medieval Times, pp. 77-78; Alexander D'Entreves,
"Introduction," in Aquinas: Selected Political Writings, pp. xxvii-xxix; Robert J.
Mulvaney, "Political Wisdom: An Interpretation of Summa Theologiae, II-II, 50,"
in Medieval Studies, XXXV (1973), pp. 298-299.
•• On monarchy as the potentially worst regime, see De Regimine Principum,
I, 2, 8, and 6; Summa Theologica, I-II, 105, a.I. For a brief discussion of the

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JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

Thus, as with the Socratic teachings on the philosopher-king,
Thomas's advocacy of rule by a virtuous monarch appears restricted to the confines of political theory and not historical
reality. 41
In its stead, Thomas advocated a mixed regime as the best
of all possible regimes. Despite the great weight he attached to
it, Aquinas only referred to a regimen bene commixtum twice in
the Summa Theologiae.42 In his approach to the subject,
Thomas completely inv:erted the Aristotelian methodology contained in the Politics. Perhaps owing to his ability (unlike
Aristotle's failure) to discover his ideal mixture in the annals
of history, Aquinas first presented his abstract criteria for a
properly mixed regime and only then entered into the discussion
of the historical actualization of that ideal. As a result, Thomas' s commentary on the regimen bene commixtum was undertaken through a deductive mode of inquiry whereby his specific
conclusions were molded principally by the criteria set forth in
a general first principle.
Thomas further broke from Aristotle's teachings in his treatment of those elements that comprised the ideal mixture in his
stated first principle. Although initially advancing a mixture of
four elements (monarchy, aristocracy, oligarchy, and demotyrannical proclivities inherent in monarchy, see Ernest Fortin, "St. Thomas
Aquinas," in Strauss and Cropsey, eds., History <Jf Political Phuosophy, p. 231;
Copleston, History of Philosophy, Vol. II, pp. 140-141; Carlyle and Carlyle, History
of Medieval Political Theory in the West, pp. 93-95,
u On the value of idealistic political reflection, see Kent Moors, "Plato's
' Republic ' On The Study of Politics," Polis, II (Spring, 1979), pp. 19-24.
••Summa Theologiae, 1-11, p.95, a.4; q.105, a.I. On the mixed regime as Thomas's
choice of the best regime form, see Richard Crofts, " The Common Good in the
Political Theory of Thomas Aquinas," The Thomist, XXXVII (January, 1973),
162; Carlyle and Carlyle, History of Medieval Political Theory in the West, pp.
94-95; Morral, Political Thought in Medieval Times, p. 78; Gilby, Political Thought
of Thomas Aquinas, pp. 289-295; Alexander D'Entreves, Medieval Contribution to
Political Thought, pp. 39-40; Fortin, "St. Thomas Aquinas," in Strauss and Cropsey,
eds., History of Political Phuosophy, p. 232; Dino Bigongiari, "Introduction," in
Political Ideas of St. Thomas Aquinas, pp. xxix-xxxi. Although he was in agreement
with Aristotle on the radical distinction between the rule of a city and the rule
of the household, Aquinas issued an intriguing parallel construction between the
mixed regime and the family in the Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle, VIII,11.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

9lll

cracy) in the Summa Theologiae, Aquinas abandoned this obvious attempt at including Aristotle's oligarchic ingredient in
the mixture in his later discussion on the subject. 43 Instead,
these later passages reveal that Thomas settled upon the Roman mixed trinity of just regimes: monarchy, aristocracy, and
democracy. 44 Thus, the criteria selected by Thomas for his ideal
mixture appear derived from a Roman mixture of regime types
that only incidentally observed the Aristotelian dictum that any
erstwhile mixture required three ingredients, rather than the
Platonic two.
Yet Thomas did not completely adopt the abstract scheme
of the Romans in advancing his composite criteria. An examination of the defined characteristics of the Thomistic ingredients
actually reveals that he did not graft accompanying governmental institutions to the three regime types as thoroughly as
the Romans did. For Thomas, only monarchy and aristocracy
were awarded their separate political institutions in the regime.45 Apparently due to a greater fear he had of the classically viewed anarchic proclivities in democracy, Aquinas allowed
an extremely limited role to the democratic ethos in the actual
governing of the regime. He injected the democratic element in
the construct only through the guise of wide-based popular
elections and the right of all citizens to seek office.46 Yet,
Thomas completely fettered the democratic ethos by actually
restricting officeholders to only the virtuous and wise who were
selected from men of the highest rank (nobility) .41 Thus,
although greatly influenced by the Roman theorists on the issue
of abstract criteria to be mixed, Thomas's overriding fear of
anarchy led him to reject that tradition's allowance for the
democratic institution of Tribune to wield actual political power
in the regime. Instead he favored a politically impotent demo"'Compare the elements proposed in Summa Theologiae I-II, q.95, a.4, with
those in I-II, p. 105, a.I.
••Summa Theologiae, I-II, q.105, a.I.

••Ibid.
••Ibid.
"Ibid.

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JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

cratic ethos fettered on all sides by restrictive qualifications for
officeholding. This initial critique of classical Roman republicanism, as a mixture that was weighed too heavily toward the
sway of democratic impulses, thus stemmed from Aquinas's
refusal to allow the democratic ingredient an equal share of
political power in the regime as had the Roman Republic.
Yet Thomas delivered his most telling and radical critique
of the Roman republican tradition in his treatment of the actualized ideal mixture. Apparently influenced by the Roman
school of thought on the nature of an analysis of the theory of
the mixed regime, as much as his deductive approach, Thomas
was not content merely with prescribing a mixture along the
lines of abstract principles. Instead, he grounded his vision of
the properly mixed regime in history. Although lauding the
Roman Republic as an acceptable alternative to tyranny,
Aquinas did not champion that polity as the actualized ideal
mixture. In fact, in De Regimine Principum, he interpreted the
Republic's founding merely as a transition from the tyrannical
despotism of the Tarquins to a simple aristocracy. 48 By so
boldly rejecting the Roman tradition of recognizing in the Republic a mixed regime par excellence, Thomas, with one masterful stroke, had cleared the ground for a novel teaching on the
subject. 49
•• De Regimine Principum, I, 4.
••This is not to say that Thomas was the first Western thinker to dismiss
the Roman Republic from the ranks of republican excellence. By conspicuously
casting his teachings on the mixed regime through an historical analysis of
Sparta rather than Rome, Plutarch dramatically had broken from his Roman
predecessors on the subject. Augustine's City of God furthermore contained
the extreme Christian view of the evils inherent in the pagan Roman Republic by
arguing that Rome was never in fact a republic because of the lack of justice
in the regime and its founding by one other than Christ. Instead, the novelty of
Thomas's teachings lay in their ability to synthesize both Plutarch's secular
and Augustine's Christian condemnations of
Rome as the actualized
ideal republic. For Plutarch's condemnation of Rome and praise of Sparta,
see Plutarch, Lives, IV, 7; VIII, 1: XXVI, 1: XXVII, 1-2. For Augustine's extreme
views, see especially Augustine, City of God, II, 21; XIX, 21. For a general
discussion of Plutarch's political thought and views of Rome, see C. P. Jones,
Plutarch and Rome (Oxford: Oxford University Pres, 1971) and Alan Wardman,
Plutarch's Livce (LQs Angeles; University of California Press, 1974). For an

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

213

History offered its ideal of the mixed regime, according to
Thomas, not in the Roman Republic, but in the divinely ordained regime constructed for the Ancient Hebrews. 50 This particular regime satisfied Thomas's abstract political criteria for
such a species (this remaining consistent with his deductive
arguments) by having its ruling elements composed of a mixture of monarchy and aristocracy tempered by a democratic
ethos. According to the Summa Theologia:e, Moses and his successors represented the monarchical element by " governing
their people as sole heads over all." 51 But under the dictates of
the revealed Divine Law, this monarchical element appointed
an assistant body of rulers from " wise and honorable men,"
thus including an aristocratic element in the regime. In citing
Exodus 18.21 (" Provide out of all the people wise men") ,
Aquinas readily found the passage supporting his belief that a
democratic ethos was present in the regime through the right of
all men to seek office. In a similar manner, Thomas based his
contention that the selection of the aristocratic Elders was wide
based and popular from a passage in Deuteronomy 2.13 (" Let
me have from among you wise men"). Such was the manner in
which Thomas sought to replace the venerated Roman Republic
with a mixture sanctioned by deduction and bolstered by the
dictates of Scripture.
Because Aquinas's depiction of this divinely ordained mixture contains his only detailed discussion of the ingredients
comprising his actualized ideal, it deserves close attention.
What initially appears from this vision is the complex position
it occupies in relationship to the classical teachings on the matter. Because of his reliance upon Biblical typology rather than
Roman historiography in locating the ideal of the mixed regime,
Thomas was able to offer a novel teaching within the classical
framework. Although clearly accepting the Roman tradition
excellent introduction to Augustine's political philosophy, see Ernest Fortin, "St.
Augustine," in Strauss and Cropsey, eds., History of Political Philosophy, pp.
151-181.

••Summa Theologice, I-II.
01

Ibid.

214

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

whereby the ideal mixture was placed in actual history, the
Thomistic use of the past in this regard was decidedly more
reminiscent of Dionysius and Plutarch than of Polybius and
Cicero.52 That is, unlike the latter, Aquinas's vision of the best
mixture, although grounded in history, did not abandon the
classical Greek emphasis upon the vital role of the lawgiver as
the embodiment of the timeless wisdom in the founding of such
a regime. In advancing an argument for the necessity of a
founder, however, Thomas once again fostered a fresh perspective upon the classical paradigm. Through his advocacy of the
divinely constructed mixture located in Scripture, Thomas, in
effect, had rendered the classical reliance upon philosophical
wisdom at the founding subservient to, albeit supportive of,
divine will and revelation. 53
Through the relegation of the Socratic inspired lawgiver of
the mixed regime to being a political apostle for Divine Law,
Aquinas had advanced a radical reassessment of the genesis of
classical republicanism. Rejecting both the Roman argument
of natural evolution and the Greek reliance upon philosophy.
Thomas presented an interpretation of the creation of the
mixed regime derived strictly from revelation. Thus, the Christian Deity rather than the Athenian Stranger or the forces of
nature emerged as the true lawgiver for the mixed republican
regime.54 As a result, Thomas had satified the Augustinian dictum that any republic, if it seeks to establish true justicer must
have Christ as its founder. Although his typological acumen in
part was merely an outgrowth of his desire to display the compatibility of reason and faith it should be noted that, as the
first theorist of the mixed regime who derived his defense from
Scripture, Thomas had established a radically novel historical
context for tracing the birth of republicanism in the West.
••Ibid.
••Although somewhat dated, Etienne Gilson's
and Revelatirm in the
Middle Ages (New York: Scribner's 1988) still remains a good general introduction
to the subject. See especially pp. 69-84 for Thomas's views on the relationship
between reason and Christian faith.
•• Augustine, City of God, II, I; xix,

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

215

Thomas's reading of the historical genesis of the mixed regime through a prism of revelation also resulted in his altering
the classical view of the projected life-span of that construct.
In large part, the classical enthusiasm for the mixed regime was
tempered by an eschatological tone. 55 Most evident in the
theories of Plato and Polybius, classical writers prophesied a
limited, albeit excellent, historical existence for a mixed regime.56 Based upon their belief that all political forms were
governed by a naturally induced cycle of degeneration and revolution, classical theorists applauded the mixed regime for its
sole capacity of all regimes to retard the natural cycle of political decay as well as it did. Despite the founder's wisdom in
recognizing that the cycle could be slowed somewhat through a
proper mixture, however, such a regime was doomed to inevitable decay and extinction within the classical perspective.
By grafting the divine will upon the mixed regime's lawgiver,
Thomas was able to escape the apocalyptic orientation of classical republicanism. According to his account, the mixed regime
no longer was the embodiment of the wisdom of a single man or
the collected historical wisdom of a particular people. Instead,
the theory was part of the Divine Law that was immutable
and eternal. Although conspicuously silent on the implications
of this transformation, it would appear that by attaching the
mixed regime to the sphere of Divine will, Thomas had in effect
granted an extended life-span to the construct. As an ingredient
in the immutable system of Divine Law, the theory of the
mixed regime was no longer subject to the vicissitudes of the
forces of nature and .time that would blatantly expose the inherent defects in its structure. To the contrary, the construct
would exist in a timeless dimension and in accordance with the
divine plan for the universe provided its structure followed that
prescribed by Scripture.
55 According to John Pocock, this notion of a limited life-span for a republic
was to have a tremendous role in shaping the contours of Renaissance republican
thought. See J, G. A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment, pp. 50-56,

•• R. D. Cumming, Human Nature and History, I, pp. 184-154; Plato, 1Aw1,
III,
Polybius, Histories, VI, 4-9.

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

In his treatment of the composite ingredients contained in
the Hebraic mixture, Thomas repeated his method of employing
the traditional categories of classical theorists to render a meaning that did not correspond entirely to the accepted one. 57 Following his abstract and deductively derived criteria for a mixed
regime, Aquinas depicted the Hebraic mix;ture as a proper mixing of the elements of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy. 58
By doing so, he was clearly influenced by the Roman theory of
the construct more than by the classical Greek in his quest for
first principles. Indeed, his great efforts and theoretical maneuverings to include a democratic ethos in the mixture appear
governed more by the sway of the Roman theorists than any
personal attachment to the virtue of that ingredient. 59
Yet, in his treatment of how these regime types were to be
institutionalized within the regime, Aquinas presented a complex theory that was shaped equally by classical republicanism
and his own novel findings. As with his Roman predecessors,
Thomas recognized the virtue of the three regimes as commensurate with their separate virtues. 60 Thus, the monarchical
element supplied the unity and wisdom necessary to all regimes,
the aristocratic Elders the enlightened policies and advice of the
best men, and the democratic process of election the attachment
of the general populace to the republic so necessary to its existence. In his discussion of the actual functions each entity would
serve, however, Thomas markedly broke from the Roman
veneration of the checks and balances system. As with his abstract criteria, Aquinas envisioned a highly restricted role for
the general populace in the regime and denied them the authority to exercise power through a separate institution. In fact, all
57 According to Walter Ullmann, this method of interjecting new meaning into
classical paradigms and terms characterized all of Thomas's political writings.
Ullmann, Medieval Political Thought, p. 176.
58 Summa Theologiae, I-II,
q.105, a.I.
•• On the non-democratic nature of Thomas's thought, see Summa Theologke, I,
xcii, I; xcvi, 4, and Summa Contra Gimtiles, III, 81. For a discussion of Thomas's
views on democracy, see D'Entreves, "Introduction," in Aquinas: Selected Political
Writings, pp. xxvi-xxvii.
••Summa Theologuw, I-II, q.105, a.I.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

U7

political power actually was wielded in the regime by Aquinas's
virtuous monarch who presided over all political functions. 61
Although granted a separate institution, the aristocratic Elders
appeared to function merely in an advisory capacity to the
monarch and clearly were subservient to his dictates.{12 As a
result, the duties assigned to the various ingredients in Thomas's regimen bene commixtum were based upon a blending of
regime types rather than the accompanying Roman institutional functions.
In vesting virtually all political power in the monarchical
element, Thomas further separated his teachings from the
classical tradition on the mixed regime. 63 Although the postPolybian theorists had also argued that one element in the
mixture must be dominant to provide stability, they unfailingly
granted this dominance to an aristocratic Senate and consciously avoided placing it in the monarchical element through their
time-honored fear of Tarquinian despotism. 64 Apparently
Thomas did not share in this exalted vision of the stabilizing
virtues of aristocracy, for he clearly assigned a subservient role
to the Elders as advisors and assistants to the monarch. Whatever his underlying reasons for emphasizing the need for the
virtues of wisdom and unity to dominate the mixture, Aquinas
was the initial theorist of the mixed regime to advocate the
dominance of the monarchical element. 65 In addition, Thomas's
replacement of a dominant aristocratic Senate wiith its mon61 Summa Theologiae, I-II, q.105, a.I.
See especially, Morrall, Political Thought
in Medieval Times, p. 78. It is primarily because of this wide-sweeping monarchical
power that many commentators have depicted Thomas's mixed regime as a limited
monarchy in fact.
••Summa Theologiae, I-II, p.105, a.I. Morrall, Political Thought in Medieval
Times, p. 78.
63 See especially Cicero, Republic, I, xxxiv, 52; I, xxxv, 55; Laws, III,
xii,
27-28; III, xii, 28, as to why this dominance belonged in the aristocratic ingredient.
•• See note 32 above.
65 For a discussion of the role of wisdom and unity in Thomas's political thought,
see Thomas Gilby, Political Thought of Thomas Aquinas, pp. 287, 294, and 296.
Frank Yartz, " Virtue as an Ordo in Aquinas," Modern Schoolman, 47 (March,
1976), 313-319; Robert Mulvaney, "Political Wisdom," in Medieval Studies, XXV
(1973)' pp. 295-302.

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

archical counterpart appears as the single and most telling
practical concern in determining his rejection of the Roman
Republic as the historically ideal mix;ture.66
The Thomistic notion of the regimen bene commixtum also
satisfied other general political criteria set forth in other sections
of the Summa Theologiae. By granting the monarch such
sweeping authority, the principle of unity, so deeply wedded to
monarchy by Thomas, would be fostered. 67 At the same time,
however, the common good would be advanced to prevent the
decay of the monarchy into a tyranny through the guise of the
enlightened advice of the aristocracy. 68 As an additional safeguard against the degeneration into tyranny, popular elections
would compel the ruling elements to pursue this vital republican end in their policies. Finally, the sense of personal attachment to the regime by the commonality that loomed so large in
the De Regimine Principum was to be achieved through the
prescribed system of election and the enlightened policies followed by the regime's ruling elements. 69
The one area where Thomas's notion of the mixed regime
does not appear to coincide neatly with his general political
teachings relates to his views regarding the mutable nature of
political life. It was Thomas's general belief that all governmental forms were altered according to the particular characteristics of climate, geography, and the history of the region in
which they were located. 70 Obviously, as the most flexible of all
political forms, the mixed regime in the abstract enjoyed char66 That is, the Republic as depicted by post-Polybian Roman theorists of the
mixed regime.
•T De Regimine Principum, I, 2; Gilby, Political Thought of Thomas Aquinas, pp.
287, 298; Fortin, "St. Thomas Aquinas," in Strauss and Cropsey, eds., History
of Political Philosophy, p. 281; Morrall, Political Thought in Medieval Times, p. 77.
68 On the role of the common good in Aquinas's thought, see Richard Crofts,
"The Common Good and the Political Theory of Thomas Aquinas," The Thomiat,
XXXVII (January, 1978), 155-178.
•• De Regimine Principum, I, 81, 82. See also, Summa Theologicae, II-II, 188-2.
TO On this point, see especially, Gilby, Political Thought of Thomas Aquinas, p.
294.

AQUINAS AND CLASSICAL REPUBLICANISM

ftl9

acteristics that freely allowed for institutional adjustments and
structural diversity as dictated by circumstance. Yet, in advancing an ideal mixture that was rigidly fixed in form by the
mandate of Divine Law, Thomas departed from this general
belief in the comparative virtues of governmental forms. In the
final outcome, then, Thomas's rigid prescription for the ideal
mixture based upon Scripture triumphed over not only the
classical republican models, but also over the forces of nature
and history
The Thomistic theory of the mixed regime thus appeared as
a complex portrait whose contours were shaped equally by the
canvas of classical republicanism and the intricate brush
strokes of Aquinas himself. This complexity was further enhanced by Thomas's method of employing classical terminology
and categories while substantially altering the traditional
meaning attached to these terms and concepts. Its indebtedness to antiquity notwithstanding, the theory stood as an alternative to the classical model of the properly mixed regime.
As such, Thomas's regimen bene commixtum embodied a novel
critique of the essence of classical republicanism.
Despite its radical intent, the influence of Aquinas's contribution on later adherents of the theory of the mixed regime
was minimal. Although cited by Sir John Fortescue, the father
of English constitutional theory, as his authority for defending
a limited monarchy, Thomas's teachings were ignored by the
mainstream of mixed regime theorists that flourished in Renaissance Italy and the Anglo-American world of the 17th and 18th
centuries. 11 In part, this neglect was the result of Aquinas's
decision to deal with the subject in only two passages of the
Summa Theologiae. The omission of Thomas from the mainstream of Western mixed regime theorists can better be explained, however, by reference to the general fate of Medieval
scholasticism and Catholic theology before the onslaught of
Renaissance humanism, the Reformation, and the Enlighten71 Sir John Fortescue, The Governance of England, I, 1-2; Corinne Weston,
English Constitutional Theory and the House of Lords, pp. 9-10.

JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

ment. 72 Despite its minimal influence, the Thomistic theory
of the regimen bene commixtum endures as a salient critique of
a tradition that molded the form and substance of western
republicanism.
JOHN R. KAYSER AND RONALD J. LETTIERI

University of New Hampshire
Durham, New Hampshire

72 For a general treatment
of the fate of Medieval scholasticism before the
onslaughts of Renaissance humanism and the Reformation, see Donald Wilcox,
In Search of God and Self (Boston:' Houghton Mifflin, 1975), pp. 43-104, 232-285.
Concerning the Enlightenment's attitude toward Thomas, see Alfred E. Taylor,
" St. Thomas Aquinas As A Philosopher," in A.. E. Taylor, ed., Phuosophical,
Studies (Freeport, New York: Books for Libraries Press, 1934), pp. 224-236, 257.

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

O

NE OF THE most frequently neglected and misunderstood concepts in the thought of Bernard Lonergan is
his intriguing notion of dialectic. Lonergan himself
is partially responsible for this state of affairs since he has never
provided a systematic account of his many and varied uses of
this term. Hence, it is the aim of this essay to provide an
exegesis of Lonergan's use of the term "dialectic" throughout
his many writings. However, the significance of this study can
only be made apparent in future papers. For it is our contention that Lonergan's use of this crucial notion constitutes the
fundamental structure underlying every aspect of the content
and method of his thought. Indeed, it is dialectic which will
provide the critic with the key to unravelling many of the complexities and ambiguities inherent within Lonergan's work as
a whole.
We will first need to examine Lonergan's account of the
"scissors-like" nature of inquiry. For, according to Lonergan,
dialectic is both an upper and lower blade: a heuristic structure
and correlative method of implementation. Then we will explore the three different but related types of dialectical heuristic
structure scattered throughout Lonergan's writings: dialectic
as sublation, dialectic as complementarity, and dialectic as contradiction. Finally we will discover the three different senses in
which Lonergan uses the term " dialectical method."

The Scissors-Like Nature of Inquiry
In Insight, Lonergan refers to dialectic as both a" method" 1
and a "pure form with general implications." 2 By "method,"
1 Bernard
Lonergan, Insight: A Study of Human Understanding (London:
Longmans, Green, and Co., Ltd., 1957), p. 485.
•Ibid., p. !l44.

221

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

Lonergan in Insight is referring to a " set of directives that serve
to guide a process towards a result." 3 The relationship between
a " method " and a " pure form " i!'I first established in Lonergan' s dissertation. Gratia Operans:" Here, Lonergan speaks of
the " pincer " movement of inquiry: the going from both the
general to the particular and from the particular to the general.
The first movement, which is what Lonergan means by a " pure
form ", is an a priori scheme which guides the " methodical "
assembling of the particulars constituting the second movement.
In Insight, Lonergan generally substitutes the term" heuristic structure " for " pure form " and replaces the terminology
of the two " pincer " movements with the "scissors " terminology of " upper and lower blades." According to Lonergan, every
inquiry operates in a scissors-like manner. 5 There is an upper
blade, i.e., heuristic structure, and a corresponding lower blade
of concrete techniques, i.e., a method. The heuristic structure
of an inquiry provides an a priori, general outline which anticipates the nature of the phenomenon under scrutiny. It is the
framework of background knowledge within which the inquirer
is able to formulate the relevant questions that need answering.
Hence, there exists a heuristic structure whenever an object of
inquiry admits antecedent determinations of a general nature.
It is the task of the lower blade of techniques to fill in the specifics of this general outline, to answer the questions raised by
a heuristic structure. Lonergan's definition of a method in
Method in Theology fits neatly the function of the lower blade. 6
For it is " a pattern of related and recurrent operations " intent
upon the acquisition of new knowledge through the use of past
knowledge as a guide.
•Ibid., p. 896.
• Bernard Lonegran, Gratia Operans: A Study of the Speculative Development
in the Writings of St. Thomas of Aquin, Diss. Pontifical Gregorian University,
Rome, 1940, pp. 8-Hl.
•Insight, pp. 104-5, srn-rn, 478, 577, 696.
•Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology (New York: Herder and Herder,
1972)' p. 251.

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

The above account, then, will help us to understand how
Lonergan regards dialectic as an a priori, generalized sketch of
the concrete world process. Indeed, dialectic possesses a metaphysical status. For, according to Lonergan, dialectic is no
mere model like so many other heuristic structures, i.e., useful
for inquiry but in no way descriptive of reality. On the contrary, dialectic, for him, constitutes the most basic, dynamic
structures of reality itself. Moreover, it is precisely the task of
dialectical method to examine and survey this dialectical world
order in its entirety.
However, the general notion of dialectical process used by
this method to guide its operations is far from being a simple
one. Indeed, there appear to be three related but different notions of dialectic scattered throughout Lonergan's thought.
Each of them as a heuristic structure is applicable to the cognitional process as well as extra-mental process in general. Lonergan's method of exposition concerning each notion of dialectic
is similar to his treatment of metaphysics. In the latter case,
he first examines the nature of cognitional process, establishes
his metaphysics on the basis of the fundamental isomorphic
elements involved in knowing, and then regards the cognitional
process as but one exemplification of this integral heuristic
structure. Likewise, Lonergan first examines each type of dialectic as a cognitional process. Then, contrary to his own explicit denial, the implicit thrust of his thought expands the
scope of each type's significance to include extra-mental processes as well. Hence, the final generic definitions of dialectic
which are arrived at are applicable to all developing processes
whatsoever.

Dialectic as Sublation
The first type of dialectic we will examine is defined in Insight by Lonergan in contrast to his definition of logic. According to Lonergan,
logic is the effort of knowledge to attain the coherence and organization proper to any stage of its development. Dialectic, on the other

224

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

hand, rests on the breakdown of efforts to attain coherence and
organization at a given stage and consists in bringing to birth a new
stage in which logic again will endeavor to attain coherence and
organization. 7

For Lonergan, then, the function of logic is the systematic ordering of all our judgments at any given time. Nevertheless,
when there exists the need to resolve the incoherence of contrary or contradictory judgments or the need to systematize
previously unrelated propositions, we are then forced radically
to revise our terms and postulates. Dialectic, then, is precisely the set of operations which effects this " movement from
one logically formalized position to another." 8 For by logical
operations alone there can be no transition from a lower viewpoint to a higher one.
Lonergan observes that this dialectical transition from lower
to higher viewpoints bears a striking resemblance to the Hegelian notion of Aufhebung. 9 Both involve the processes of rejection and retention. In some sense, a higher viewpoint is said
both to retain a lower viewpoint as well as to negate it. This
paradoxical achievement of the higher viewpoint is repeatedly
referred to by Lonergan as a " sublation." It is in his postInsight writings that he provides a further analysis of this term
which nuances his earlier assertion as regards the resemblance
between his notion and that of HegeL
According to Lonergan in Method in Theology, his notion of
sublation is used in Rahner's sense of the term, rather than in
the Hegelian sense:
That which sublates goes beyond what is sublated, introduces something new and distinct, puts everything on a new basis, yet so far
from interfering with the sublated or destroying it, on the contrary
needs it, includes it, preserves all its proper features and properties
and carries them forward to a fuller realization within a richer context.10
lndght, p. 276.
Ibid., p. 422.
0 Ibid., p. 874.
10 Method in Theology, p. 241.
7

8

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

Indeed, throughout all his works, Lonergan often uses in·
terchangeably the term " sublate " and its equivalent formula
" to preserve and to complement." Furthermore, what he has
omitted in his definition from the Hegelian view of Aufhebung
is the position that "the higher reconciles a contradiction in
the lower." 11 For Hegel, the contradiction between two lower
viewpoints is real and its resolution is only possible given the
affirmation of the principle of non-identity. Lonergan, on the
contrary, always differentiates the relevant aspects of a situation to avoid falling into Hegel's trap of having to repudiate the
principle of identity. Consequently, sublation, for Lonergan,
cannot mean the" reconciliation of a contradiction" in Hegel's
meaning of the phrase.
We should note that for Lonergan the formulae " to reject
and retain " and " to preserve and complement " are really
identical. "Retention" and "preservation" can easily be seen
to be synonymous. But " complementation " and "rejection "
can only be regarded as the same if we realize that to add something to something else is to change that other thing, i.e., to
negate or reject it as it was. Now it is the conjunction of both
operations, to preserve and to complement, which makes sublation such an interesting process. The movement from one
logically formalized system to another need not be just a complete substitution. For when systems are related in such a way
that the higher sublates the lower, there is not only discontinuity but continuity as well. Indeed 1 according to Lonergan, to
speak of change and not just of " annihilation and a new creation," something must be preserved as well as complemented. 12
From all the above, it is clear that this first type of dialectic
is the pure form of the process which leads to the emergence of
higher viewpoints. However, it would be wrong to conclude
that this use of dialectic is restricted solely to the realm of concepts. In Lonergan's discussion of his world view of emergent
11 Bernard Lonergan, A Second Collection, eds. William Ryan and Bernard
Tyrrell (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1974), p. 80.
12 lnsig//,t, pp.

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

probability, he argues that the whole world process is generated
by the tension between two opposing principles, i.e., the principles of stability and development. 13 The similarity between
the opposition of these two principles in world process and the
opposition between logic and dialectic in cognitional process is
too striking to ignore.
Indeed, it is even further reinforced by Lonergan's transposition of his world view of emergent probability into the metaphysical context of the genetic method. Lonergan's analysis of
organic development here reveals the two-fold function of the
higher system as both integrator and operator. The task of
the higher system as integrator is to effect the "simultaneous
interlocking " of parts in a whole, while the task of the higher
system as operator is to generate the" successive interlocking"
of emerging wholes.14 Once again, the parallel between the confunctions of the higher system and the complementary
cognitional roles of logic and dialectic is too striking to ignore.
Consequently, there is adequate reason to extend the scope
of this type of dialectic to include not only the cognitional
realm of ideas and their ongoing generation but extra-mental
realities as well. This type of dialectic, then, can best be defined in the following generic manner. The dialectic of sublation
refers to the heuristic structure which anticipates the general
outline of the emergence of higher systems from lower systems.

Dialectic as Complementarity
The second type of dialectic, which we will call the dialectic
of complementarity, has probably been the most misinterpreted
notion in all of Lonergan's thought. For it is generally confused
by most critics with the dialectic of contradiction. This second
type of dialectic, moreover, is first introduced as regards its
implications for cognitional and historical processes. Only later
does Lonergan's thought reveal this dialectic's relevance for
even physical and biological systems. Finally, dialectic as comIbid., p. 123.
"Ibid., p. 465.

13

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

227

plementarity is the only one for which Lonergan provides a
succinct yet detailed definition that is generic in its scope:
Let us say that a dialectic is a concrete unfolding of linked but opposed principles of change. Thus there will be a dialect, if
I) there is an aggregate of events of a determinate character,
the events may be traced to either or both of two principles,
3) the principles are opposed y,et bound together, and
4) they are modified by the changes that successively result from
them. 15

Lonergan later argues that a dialectical interplay need not be
solely " bipolar " in nature. He envisages that dialectic can
also be " transformed from a bipolar to a tripolar conjunction
and opposition." 16 Indeed, theoretically, a process could be
composed of an indefinite number of interacting principles.
To understand precisely what Lonergan means by the " opposition," " linkage," and " modification " of the constitutive
principles underlying any dynamic system requires that we
first consider the paradigm case of cognitional process. In Verbum, Lonergan argues that the reasoning process which engenders knowledge" is a dialectical interplay of sense, memory,
imagination, insight, definition, critical reflection, and judgment." 17 In Insight, Lonergan organizes these elements of cognition into the three levels of experience, understanding, and
judgment. According to Lonergan, the second level presupposes
and complements the :first, while the third level presupposes and
complements the second. But he also adds that, besides this
" cumulative " character of the process, there is also the
"cyclic" character of the "self-correcting process of learning"
to consider. 18 Lower levels also presuppose and complement
higher levels in the ongoing circuit of learning.
This paradigm case of cognitional process suggests that the
" opposing " structural " principles " of change underlying any
is

10

Ibid., p. !U7.
Ibid., p. 7!l8.

"Bernard Lonergan, Verbum: Word and Idea in Aquinas, ed. David Burrell
(Notre Dame: U. of Notre Dame Press, 1967), p. 58.
18 Insight, pp. 174, 886, 875.

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

evolving process mutually sublate each other and, hence, " modify" each other. Dialectic as complementarity thus provides
the needed heuristic assumption for the examination of dynamic
systems. It anticipates a " structural " whole which " is related
to each of the parts, and each of the parts is related to the other
parts and to the whole." 19 Indeed, such a "self-assembling,
self-constituting" whole is one in which
the set of internal relations is of the greatest significance. Each part
is what it is in virtue of its functional relations to other parts; there
is no part that is not determined by the exigence of other parts; and
the whole possesses a certain inevitability in its unity, so that the
removal of any part would destroy the whole, and the addition of
any further part would be ludicrous. 20

In the above passage from an article written after the publication of Insight, the term "part" is synonymous with what
Lonergan calls a dialectical" principle" in Insight. A dynamic
system, then, is one whose parts are dialectically related; in their
interplay each part sublates, i.e., presupposes and complements,
every other part and is sublated in tum in a circuit-like manner.21
Hence, the dialectic of complementarity involves the notion
of sublation yet adds to this prior notion something new. The
dialectic between any X and Y in the latter sense refers to the
preservation and complementation of a lower system by a higher system. The dialectic between any X and Y in the former
sense refers to that mutual operation of preservation and complementation existing between two complementary principles
of change within a single ongoing process. Indeed, in Method
in Theology, Lonergan distinguishes the genetic, complementary, and dialectic-al relationships existing between rival paradigms.22 If we were to generalize his remarks, we might say that
two systems are genetically related if one is a higher system
19

Bernard Lonergan, Collection, ed. Fred Crowe (Montreal: Palm Publishers,

1967)' p.

Ibid.
Insight, p. 461.
22 Method
in Theology, p.
20

21

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

sublating a lower system, that two systems are complementary
if both are lower systems sublated by a higher system, and that
two systems are dialectically related if each contradicts the
other. This third alternative we will examine in the following
section.
Lonergan uses other terms to describe this second type of
dialectical interplay: " functional interdependence," " reciprocal dependence," " the tension of opposites," " genetic interpenetration," and, perhaps the most intriguing one of all, "symbiosis." 23 Indeed, a dynamic system is nothing other than a
living together of disparate elements in which each part is enhanced by its dialectical give and take transactions with every
other part.
However, the notion of "integration" is even more crucial
for understanding the dialectic of complementarity. According
to Lonergan, the progressive development of a dynamic system
results " from the harmonious working of the opposed principles." 24 He illustrates this process in his discussion of the
operation of the law of integration in the human being. According to Lonergan, within man " the initiative of development
may be organic, psychic, intellectual, or external, but the development remains fragmentary until the principle of correspondence between different levels is satisfied." 25 Hence, for Lonergan, each of these "levels " is one of the constitutive principles
of change within man. Each initiative at one level, moreover,
must be met by complementary adjustments in the other levels
if the integrity of the human person is to be maintained.
The formula for progress, then, is the " harmonious co-operation " of dialectical principles of change. Decline, on the other
hand, results from the "elimination of a genuine part" from
a dynamic whole.26 This mutilation of a whole upsets the careful balance that has been achieved by any evolving system,
and, consequently, a distortion of the dialectic of complemen••Ibid., pp. 126, 141; Insight, pp. 450, 555, 706.
••Insight, p. 244.
••Ibid., p. 471.
••Method in Theology, p. 244.

230

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

tarity is introduced. It is to this "distorted dialectic" that we
must now turn our attention. It is only in the section in Insight
concerning the dialectic of community that Lonergan discusses
the nature of the " distorted " dialectic. In the paragraphs to
follow, we will attempt to generalize the remarks Lonergan
makes as regards the specific distortions of human culture.
In a harmonious dialectic, it must be remembered, the opposing principles are interdependent, forming a functional unity.
Each part of the dynamic system conditions every other part
and is in turn conditioned by them. Now Lonergan goes out of
his way to refute the view which identifies a distortion with one
or other of the principles involved. For example, some would
hold that "egoism" is the result of man's self-centered animality. The implication which we are expected to draw is that
man would be able to surmount egoism by suppressing his
animal sensibility. On the contrary, Lonergan argues that
" egoism is neither mere spontaneity nor pure intelligence but
an interference of spontaneity with the development of intelligence." 27 Hence, the distorted dialectic is not due to the mere
presence of any one principle but rather is due to the absence
of some complementary principle.
Perhaps it would be more precise to state that it is the
" dominance " of one principle suppressing the other correlative
principles which results in a distorted dialectic. Lonergan's
chief example of such a process of aberration is his view of class
warfare. 28 The dominant class always attempts to hinder and
control the lower classes as much as possible. Nevertheless, as
Lonergan observes, " the essential logic of the distorted dialectic is a reversal . . . the distortion both weakens the dominance and strengthens the opposed principle to restore an
equilibrium." 29 The more oppressed the masses become, the
more likely becomes the possibility of a revolution.
However, this "equilibrium" re-established by a successful
01 Insight, p. !!19.
•• Ibid., pp. 224-!il5.
•• Ibid., p. !'lSS.

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

revolt is inherently unstable. Lonergan envisages a succession
of " totalitarian " principles each out to destroy its predecessors.
The only " discernible intelligibility " in such a state of affairs
is the equilibrium of pressures, i.e., the balance of powers. What
each principle contributes
less and less is some part of a coherent whole that will ask for its
completion, and more and more it is some arbitrary fragment that
can be rounded off only by giving up the attempt to complete the
other arbitrary fragments that have preceded or will follow it. 80

Hence, the dynamic of progress is replaced by one of stagnation
and decline. Instead of the balance of complementary principles each seeking to preserve and add to the others' achievements, you have the parry and thrust of opponents out to
abolish each other.
In conclusion, dialectic as complementarity has been viewed
as the heuristic assumption underlying the study of dynamic
systems. It is exemplified in any process whose unfolding is
the result of the interaction of opposed principles of change.
Such an interaction is constituted by the dynamics of mutual
sublation. We also noted the differences between the harmonious and distorted dialectics. The former generates progressive
development while the latter breeds stagnation and decline.

Dialectic as Contradiction
The final type of dialectic, dialectic as contradiction, is that
which most critics have regarded as Lonergan's sole dialectic.
Indeed, Lonergan gives them ample reason for such a view. For
the predominant use of the term " dialectic" throughout Insight and Method in Theology is as regards aberrant historical
process. Moreover, Lonergan unequivocally restricts the scope
of this third dialectic to the human realm of affairs. 31 However,
we will discover such a position to be inconsistent with the
overall thrust of Lonergan's system.
"0

81

Ibid., p. 229.
Ibid., pp. 422, 575.

232

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

In the previous section, we noted that a harmonious dialectic
anticipates an ideal line of pure progress, while a distorted dialectic anticipates aberration, stagnation, and disintegration. If
the harmonious dialectic constitutes an " intelligibly related
sequence of systems," then the distorted dialectic constitutes a
succession of different systems whose relations are not directly
intelligible. 32 For Lonergan, then, a dynamic system can only
exercise " genuineness " if it preserves the necessary tension between its linked but opposed principles of change. But it must
not be thought that the failure to achieve progressive authenticity constitutes what is meant by the dialectic of contradiction. For this third dialectic is not the conflict between " totalitarian " principles refusing to be integrated, i.e., the distorted
dialectic. On the contrary, since historical process is constituted neither by an ideal line of pure progress nor by the
inverse phenomenon of decline, then the dialectic of contradiction is nothing less than the fundamental tension existing between those opposing forces of advance and collapse.
This third type of dialectic, then, represents the conflict between the dynamism of the harmonious dialectic and the
dynamism of the distorted dialectic. In the human realm, this
dialectic is the precise opposition between authenticity and
unauthenticity. It expresses the conflict and not the interdependence between progressive and disintegrating systems. For
example, Lonergan's ideal of the" cosmopolis ",i.e., progressive
culture, is dialectically opposed to its less authentic rivals which
contain within themselves the seeds for their own reversal, e.g.,
Communism or Fascism. It is important to note, therefore, that
the conflict between two extremist groups such as Communism
and Nazism does not exemplify the dialectic of contradiction.
On the contrary, this distorted dialectic is the result of the refusal of these two ideologies to be incorporated into a higher
synthesis which does justice to the partial truths espoused by
these ideologies. Hence, those systems of thought which only
regard certain aspects of experience, ignoring or rejecting other
•• Ibid., p. 485.

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

aspects, are all "partly right and partly wrong, right in their
affirmation, but mistaken in their exclusion." 33
The dialectic of contradiction, then, involves the rivalry between a lower system and the higher system which would
sublate it. This type of opposition, furthermore, is irreducible.
Hence, of two mutually exclusive viewpoints, one must be rejected: " What in one is found intelligible, in another is unintelligible. What for one is true, for another is false. What for
one is good, for another is evil." 84
Finally, it simply is not true that the dialectic of contradiction is relevant only to the study of conceptual systems or of
human affairs and not to the study of strictly natural processes
as Lonergan contends. 35 For distortion occurs at all levels of the
concrete world process, and, hence, so does the opposition between the dynamics of progressive and regressive systems.
Lonergan himself admits that the "field " within which the
entire world process develops is the " finality " of proportionate
being.86 Indeed, according to
Finality is no less the sadness of failure than the joy of success. It
is to be discerned no less in false starts and in breakdowns than in
stability and progr,ess. It is as much the meaning of aberration and
corruption and decline as of sanity and honesty and development. 87

Hence, even the most static physical systems of revolving
" schemes of recurrence " are open to the dynamics of both
development and decline. Thus Lonergan cannot consistently
uphold his world view of emergent probability and assert at the
same time that the dialectic of contradiction is but the result
of human bias alone. For the " mistakes " of the physical and
biological realms may be different from the " errors " of human
beings. Nevertheless, the extinction of some animal species
constitutes a " breakdown " of sorts as much as the collapse of
the Stock Market in
••Collection, pp.
••Method in Theology, p.
••Insight, p. 422.
••Ibid., p. 462.
••Ibid., p. 448.

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J,

We have therefore distinguished three notions of dialectical
process in Lonergan's thought. Moreover, each type is as relevant for extramental systems as it is for cognitional processes.
The first type, i.e., sublation, refers to the genesis of a higher
system from a lower one. The second type, i.e., complementarity, refers to the harmonious unfolding of opposed but linked
principles of change in any dynamic system. The third type,
i.e., contradiction, refers to the conflict between progressive and
distorted systems within a larger, ongoing process.
Finally, it is important to note that the dialectical notion of
complementarity presupposes and complements the dialectical
notion of sublation, while the dialectical notion of contradiction
sublates the dialectical notion of complementarity. Hence, it
is only the dialectic of contradiction which can serve as the
most comprehensive heuristic structure for our examination of
the entire world order. Indeed, its anticipation of the ultimate
design of the universe of proportionate being makes it a metaphysics. Thus, as we will see, it is very much related to Lonergan's notion of a "universal viewpoint" whose hermeneutical
function is to anticipate the totality of possible human expressions of meaning.
Dialeotical Method
In the previous sections, we have outlined Lonergan's notion
of dialectic as the heuristic structure which anticipates the general outline of the concrete world process as a whole. Our final
task is now to examine the nature of " dialectical method," the
lower blade of techniques by which the inquirer can concretely
explore this dynamic universe.
Before we can accomplish this, however, we must first distinguish this use of the term " dialectical method " from two
other uses which Lonergan makes _of this term throughout his
writings. First, we already noted Lonergan's contrast of the
two cognitional functions of logic and dialectic. Dialectic constitutes a sub-set of mental operations by which lower viewpoints can be sublated by higher viewpoints. It is a set of

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

235

techniques directing the inquirer to the achievement of a definite result. Hence, dialectic in this sense of the word merits
the title of " method." Lonergan's use of the term " dialectical
method" in this sense, however, is a reference to a type of
cognitional process. It is not a method for the study of dialectical processes.
In Method in Theology, Lonergan proposes a different use of
the term " dialectical method." Indeed, it is the only use of the
term which most critics have examined thus far. In this work,
Lonergan is confronted by the hermeneutical problem of dealing with radically different interpretations of a text or historical
period. He is aware that such differences, when not merely
perspectival, are due to the biases possessed by the different
competing exegetes. Moreover, Lonergan maintains that individual, group, and general biases result from the failure to
achieve intellectual, moral, and religious conversion.· Hence,
Lonergan's dialectical method is his technique for fostering the
conversion of the unconverted in order to achieve an objective
interpretation of a text. 38 The attainment of an objective interpretation is therefore an issue which challenges the very authenticity of those participating in the hermeneutica1 enterprise.
According to Lonergan, the fourth functional specialty of
dialectic, i.e., dialectical method, presupposes and complements
the prior specialties of research, interpretation, and history. It
concerns itself with all the conflicting efforts to attain a comprehensive understanding of history. Hence, it is a second order
science in that it is seeking a comprehensive interpretation of
interpretations. The dialectician, then, is the historian who
makes his own enterprise the subject of inquiry. He realizes
that the conflicts between himself and his fellow historians are
the results of those very conflicts in the past which they are all
studying.
Now the dialectician hopes to bring about a critical comparison of opposing interpretations in order to promote conversion.
Hence, he sets up a heuristic structure, i.e., the universal view••Method in Theology, p. 246.

Q36

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

point, which makes the concrete oppositions intelligible as
manifestations of converted and unconverted consciousness. 39
However, the dialectician can only resolve these conflicts by
reversing counterpositions and developing positions. 40
Lonergan has no illusions that the mere performance of these
above operations on the part of the dialectician will result in
the achievement of authenticity and objectivity. On the contrary, he is fully aware that the dialectician who undertakes
this task can be someone who has not undergone intellectual,
moral, and religious conversion. 41 The results performed by
different dialecticians, then, are not expected to be uniform.
For the positions developed by the unconverted will of course
be, in actuality, counterpositions. On first glance, we can only
wonder whether Lonergan has merely complicated the problematic situation of a pluralistic set of histories with the addition
of an opposed set of dialectics.
But Lonergan would maintain that the whole point of having
each dialectician distinguish between what he perceives to be
positions and what he regards as counterpositions is to bring
out into the open the real differences which separate historians.
Hence, dialectic results in the "objectification " of each dialectician's horizon. According to Lonergan, they are thereby
providing one another with the evidence for a judgment on personal
achievement of self-transcendence. They reveal the selves that did
the research, offered the interpretation, studied the history, passed
the judgment of value. 42

Lonergan even advocates a "final objectification of horizon." 43
The very process just completed in which each dialectician
develops what he regards as positions and reverses what he
feels to be counterpositions now becomes the subject of inquiry.
The dialecticians are now asked to pass judgment on the
achievements of each other, this time as dialecticians and not
Ibid., pp. 141, 250.
Ibid., p. 249.
41 Ibid., p. 251.
42 Ibid., p. 25S.
•• Ibid., p. 250.
39

•0

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

287

as historians. Hence, this final objectification constitutes an
interpretation of an interpretation (doing dialectic) of an interpretation (doing history).
What does Lonergan hope to achieve by the hermeneutical
process of dialogue? He argues that
while it will not be automatically efficacious, it will provide the
open-minded, the serious, the sincere with the occasion to ask themselves some basic questions, first about others but eventually, even
about themselves. It will make conversion a topic and thereby promote it. 44

Hence, the functional specialty of dialectic puts together two
human subjects whose views are dialectically contradictory.
The hope is that, through ongoing dialogue, each participant
will trigger within himself the self-correcting process of learning.
It is hoped that the experience of another view of authenticity
will compel the unconverted to grasp the contradiction existing
between their experience and their biased beliefs.
The functional specialty of dialectic, then, is a method for
resolving differences. Moreover, each participant in this dialogue, utilizes the " universal viewpoint " as a heuristic structure for ordering the progressive and regressive dynamics of history. The functional specialty of dialectic, however, is not the
lower blade set of techniques by which we can fill in the specifics of a generalized view of the dialectical universe. Nor is
the universal viewpoint the heuristic structure of such a" method ' since it is only concerned with the evolution of human
cult<ire and not of the world as a whole. We must look for this
latter "dialectical method " in Jnsi,ght. Yet, even in this work,
dialectical method so often denotes merely " dialectical analysis," i.e., an early version of Method in Theology's fourth
functional specialty. What we are seeking, however, is not a
dialectical dialogue, but a cognitional methodology which can
examine dialectical processes of whatever kind.
The reason for our difficulty in locating this use of the term
"dialectical method" is due to Lonergan's unfortunate distinc.. Ibid., p. 253.

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

tion of the genetic and dialectical methods. For we are searching for a method that can examine the concrete world process
outlined by an upper blade of generalities, i.e., the integral
heuristic structure of the dialectic of contradiction. Now, according to Lonergan, dynamic systems can either develop in a
progressive or aberrant fashion. Any method which proposes
to study a dynamic system must therefore anticipate the possibility of both harmonious and distorted dialectical processes.
If we are to take Lonergan's descriptions of the genetic and
dialectical methods seriously, then neither of them alone is
capable of examining the concrete world process. On the contrary, he argues that they are complementary in their anticipations.45 The genetic method is said to examine progressive
dynamic systems while the dialectical method is said to be
responsible for examining systems in decline.
However, if we look closely at Lonergan's actual accounts
of the genetic and dialectical methods, not only will we discover
that they both include the heuristic assumptions underlying
both progressive and aberrant processes, but also that, as a
result, they are virtually identical. Let us first examine the
genetic method. According to Lonergan, the genetic method
studies developing processes. Moreover, he argues that the
" field " within which the developing world process occurs is
the" finality" of proportionate being. 46 It cannot be true, then,
that the genetic method restricts itself merely to the examination of progressive systems. For, as we noted earlier, finality is
as much concerned with decay and decline as it is with growth
;md success. Indeed, even to account for the biological realm
of the universe alone, the genetic method would have to include
within its heuristic structure the assumption '.)f possible failures
and evolutionary dead-ends.
Since in Jnsi,ght Lonergan introduces the dialectical method
only to supplement the genetic method as regards the phenomenon of human bias, the only status it has is as a herme45
46

Insight, p. 485.
Ibid., p.

LONERGAN'S

NOTION OF DIALECTIC

neutical method for analyzing the historical accumulation of
positions and counter-positions. Hence, its heuristic assumption is none other than the universal viewpoint and its task
identical to that of Lonergan's fourth functional specialty
which we have just examined. However, dialectical analysis
reveals "both the accumulation of insights moving to higher
viewpoints and the reversal of aberrations that were brought
about by the interference of alien desire" in the historical
process. 47 It could hardly do otherwise if its function is for
" sorting things out." 48 Therefore, not only does genetic method
study both progressive and regressive systems, but dialectical
method also examines phases of both progress and decline in
their interaction throughout history. Lonergan is mistaken,
then, when he argues that his genetic method only examines
processes of progressive sublation and the dialectical method
only processes in steady decline.
The question we must now answer is why Lonergan makes
a sharp distinction between the genetic and dialectical methods.
To restrict the dialectical method only to the human realm of
affairs seems to be arbitrary, moreover, since even the nonhistorical realms share the same dynamics of dialectical sublation, complementarity, and contradiction. Indeed, it would
seem to make more sense for the dialectical method to constitute not only a hermeneutic for the interpretation of historical
phenomena but a methodology for the examination of all
phenomena whatsoever. Perhaps Lonergan merely wished to
preserve the symmetry of a system in which complementary
classical and statistical methods are flanked by equally complementary genetic and dialectical methods.
A more telling explanation, however, is Lonergan's mistaken
identification of the dialectic of sublation as the heuristic assumption of the genetic method. If this were the case, then of
course the genetic method would anticipate only progressive
processes. But Lonergan also declares that the field of the
17 Ibid., p.
••Second Collection, p.

Q40

RONALD MCKINNEY, S.J.

genetic method is that of " finality " which implies both harmonious and distorted processes. However, he cannot have it
both ways. Moreover, Lonergan's mistaken identification of
the distorted dialectic as the heuristic assumption of the dialectical method would also explain his conception of this method as
concerned only with aberrant systems. But he also argues that
dialectical analysis reveals both progressive and aberrant
processes in conflict. Hence, once again, he cannot have it both
ways. Therefore, since Lonergan never consistently holds to
this arbitrary separation of the genetic and dialectical methods
throughout Insight, it is our suggestion that we regard these
two methods as one and the same.
The dialectical-genetic method, then, is nothing less than the
integration of the classical and statistical methods constituting
Lonergan's world view of emergent probability. Indeed, as an
integral heuristic structure, the dialectical method is equivalent
to Lonergan's notion of metaphysics. Though we have outlined
the heuristic assumptions underlying this ultimate method, we
have as yet to sketch the lower blade techniques by which one
explores in detail this dialectical universe of proportionate bemg.
It appears that Lonergan makes his genetic method responsible for the study of dynamic systems. According to Lonergan,
this method (now possessing greater significance after our
analysis) uses both synchronic and diachronic procedures. 49
The scientist must first investigate the higher system as integrator, i.e., describe parts, relate parts, and construct a flexible
circle of schemes of recurrence in which the system functions.
Then he must investigate the higher system as operator, i.e.,
duplicate this synchronic procedure " with respect to successive
stages in the development of the same " system and then compare such findings concerning the different stages. This comparative study will reveal the direction towards which the
system is headed, whether progressive or not. Hence, the
genetic-dialectical method which explores the universe in light
•• Insight, pp. 464-67.

LONERGAN'S NOTION OF DIALECTIC

fl41

of its metaphysical heuristic assumptions makes use of both
logical and dialectical procedures. It is thus equivalent to
Lonergan's description of "method" in Method in Theology
as " the grouping together of logical and non-logical operations." 50 Indeed, a dynamic system which functions as both
integrator and operator could hardly be studied otherwise than
by a set of cognitional operations which matches the synchronic
features of the structure which it examines.

Conclusion
We have examined Lonergan's complex use of the notion of
dialectic throughout his thought and have attempted to resolve
any inconsistencies that we have discovered. Our aim was to
find a key for understanding more clearly the complexities and
ambiguities in the content and method of Lonergan's thought
as a whole. First, the scissors-like nature of inquiry was examined in order to discover what Lonergan meant by referring
to dialectic as both a heuristic structure and a correlative
method. Then we explored the three distinctive types of dialectical heuristic assumptions: dialectic as sublation, dialectic as
complementarity, and dialectic as contradiction. Finally, we
determined the significance of dialectical method by examining
the various uses Lonergan made of this term throughout his
writings. Hopefully, the reader has already begun to see the
significance of this study for understanding Lonergan's thought
as a whole.
RoNALD McKINNEY,

Weston School of Theology
Cambridge, Massachusetts

00

l'rlethod in Theology, p. 6.

S.J.

THE INFALLIBILITY OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE
IN JUAN DE TORQUEMADA, O.P.

V

HE DEBATE OVER the infallibility of papal definiions of faith remains largely unresolved. This is so
espite the theological discussions resulting from attempts to re-examine Vatican I's Pastor Aeternus in the light
of the Second Vatican Council and the decade of controversies
surrounding the publication of Paul VI's Humanae Vitae and
Hans Kiing's Unfehlbar?. There is a continuing discussion, not
least of all in English, of not only the interpretation of the
definition of Vatican I, but also of the history of the dogma and
its present meaningfulness. 1 The present state of the question
requires that further work be done on the historical development of the concepts and language about this aspect of the
petrine role in the church. Furthermore, recent ecumenical
conversations demonstrate the continuing importance of this
theme within the mutual search for deeper understandings of
the nature of the Word of God, Christian faith, the teaching
office in the church, and ministry. In order to begin to fill one
of the gaps remaining in the history of papal infallibility as
well as uncover some theological insights which may be of use
in further discussion, this essay will investigate one significant
moment of the historical articulation of this doctrine.
This moment came as the dust from the western schism and
the conciliarist struggles settled throughout fifteenth century
Christendom. 2 The aging curial cardinal Juan de Torquemada
1 An insightful survey of the literature in English may be found in John T. Ford,
C.S.C., " Infallibility: A Review of Recent Studies," Theological,Studies 40 (1979),
pp. £73-305.
2 For a characterization
of the mid-fifteenth century as a period marked by the
end of the western schism and the demise of conciliarism, and thus as a period of
" triumph " of papal power and a parallel resurgence of papalist ideas, see Augustin
Fliche-Victor Martin, Histoire de L'Eglise depuis les origines jusqu'a nos joura

242

THE INFALLIBILITY

OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE

243

collected the thoughts and writings of a lifetime and proceeded
to write the first specifically ecclesiological treatise in the history of Christian theology. This Summa de Ecclesia, composed
about 1453, together with the Commentaria super DecrefJum
(1464), represents the culmination of a career of thorough
study and heated debate.
Despite the statement of the preface of the Summa that it
is written " against the adversaries of the Church and the
primacy of the apostolic see," this mature masterwork of the
theologian of the papal resurgence does not deserve to be written off as solely or blindly polemic. In fact, the key point of
his theology, papal infallibility, demonstrates by its central
positioning a nuanced conception of the petrine role influenced
by the Thomistic Scholastic tradition as much as the attacks
of conciliarists and Hussites. This infallibility, though a relatively new concept at the time, evokes a certain organic vision
of the role of magisterium, especially the papal, in the life of
faith of the individual Christian and the unity of the entire
Christian church. Thus this thought, crucial to the later understanding of the infallibility of papal decisions of faith, also discloses the important Thomistic conceptions which underlie
much of the development of this doctrine and which might
contribute significantly to a renewal of a theology of the papal
magisterium within the post-conciliar church.
We shall treat Torquemada's view on infallibility in the
Summa de Ecclesia by first looking at the argumentation of
Chapters 109-112, discussing its relation to Torquemada's
earlier exposition of infallibility at Nurnberg and Mainz (14381439), these chapters' place within the work, and then the
argumentation itself. Secondly, we shall attempt to uncover
the internal movement of the argument to determine if there
is a central point being made, which discussion will necessitate
a brief look at the principal antecedents of Torquemada's posi(Paris: Blond & Gay), Vol. XIV (1964), pp. 516-519; Vol. XV (1951), pp. 16-65;
cf. also Francis Oakley, The Western Church in the Later Middle Ages (Ithaca,
N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, 1979), pp. 55-79.

244

EUGENE S. MORRIS

tion. As a result, we will be able to make a deeper examination
of the theory and indicate some elements which are particularly
significant for Torquemada's original model of the petrine office
and which raise further questions concerning the later formulations and understandings of papal infallibility.
The Argumentation of Summa de Ecclesia.II, 109-112
Before considering Torquemada's later presentation on infallibility, we should briefly discuss its relation to his earlier
work as papal legate. As the conflict between Eugene IV and
the Council of Basel was coming to a head, two Imperial Diets
were convoked to attempt to resolve the issue, one at Nurnberg
in 1438, the other at Mainz in 1439. Torquemada was sent as
part of the papal delegation hoping to gain lay and ecclesiastical
lords' support for Eugene's transferrals of the Council to Ferrara in November 1437 and to Florence in January 1439. At
both Diets Torquemada prepared a theological paper (complementing a canonist presentation) defending the authority of
the pope and the actions of Eugene in particular. The papal
'court theologian never actually addressed Nurnberg and may
only have submitted his Propositio in written form at Mainz,
but both documents are significant for the development of his
thought. 3
The Nurnberg discourse contains major citations from St.
Thomas Aquinas, and in fact the bulk of his arguments concerning the papacy and power are Thomistic. There are two
principal axes to the paper. The first is a comparison of the
ecclesiastical hierarchy to the heavenly one, which provides
four ideas about ecclesiastical authority: a hierarchy or ranks,
monarchy (the papacy) of the church, the full power of the
pope, and the papacy as the source of all other ecclesiastical
powers, including general councils. Secondly, ten privileges of
•George Hoffman, S.J., "Due Discorsi di Giovanni da Torquemada O.P. nella
dieta di Norimberga (autunno 1438) e nel congresso di Magonza (primavera
1439)" in Papato, Conciliarismo, Patriarcato (1438-1439), Miscellanea Historiae
Pontificiae (Rome, 1940), pp. 9-30.

THE INFALLIBILITY

OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE

fl45

the apostolic see are presented which basically deal with this
supreme power, the second of which is infallibility of a papal
" iudicium in his quae fidei sunt." The foundation of the system
of his later work is already formed here. 4
Despite the presence of a certain structure in the mind of
Torquemada at Nurnberg, the Propositio prepared for presentation to the Mainz Diet adopts a much different battle strategy
with a corresponding different internal theological logic. Torquemada's task was to demonstrate-again from the point of
view of a theologian-the justice of Eugene's cause. 5 Though
the issue is not directly one of faith, the papal orator opens with
dogmatic heavy artillery. Whereas in the Nurnberg Propositio
papal infallibility was only one of ten privileges of the apostolic
see stated well into the text, at Mainz infallibility is the first
point and seemingly the cornerstone of the argument. It is
significant to note that at this point Eugene's fortunes were at
their lowest. The Council of Basel had remained in session and
become more radical despite his two tr an sferrals and suspension
of the council, and the successes of the Council of Florence were
yet to come. In fact this second, more select Diet was held as
a desperate measure to secure support for Eugene against the
Baselians.
The Mainz discourse is again principally a collection of citations of authorities hung on a logical skeleton: Torquemada begins with a proof of the infallibility of the Holy See in matters
of faith; he then describes the pope's authority as shepherd,
head, and "princeps "; finally he expounds the justice of the
cause of Eugene IV on the basis of the derived authority of
general councils. He concludes by affirming that the ministry
of Eugene as pope is a service of unity and peace, which are
best served by submitting to his authority. 6 In this all-important first section Torquemada demonstrates the infallibility of
the judgments of the apostolic see:
•Ibid., pp. 15-19.
• Ibid., p. 22.
•Ibid., pp. !il4-26; pp. 28-!il9.

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EUGENE S. MORRIS

Divine mercy has strengthened the apostolic throne so firmly in
truth that ... as the teaching of the holy Fathers attests, its judgment in matters of faith cannot err. It was soundly fitting that
that see which was instituted in its power of counsel as teacher of
faith and hinge of all churches was endowed by God Himself, the
author of all things, with the office of infallibility of judgment in
those things which are of faith and necessary for the salvation of
human persons .... 7

He does so from the promise of Christ to Peter," I have prayed
for you that your faith may not fail. You in turn must
strengthen your brothers" (Lk 22,32). This indefectibility of
faith is the munus infallibilitatis of the apostolic see to which
are attached several juridical privileges which, at least by their
positioning within the text, are to be considered as following
from this infallibility. Though he has introduced an idea of
"fittingness", this is not utilized to draw out these privileges
from the primary one.
Before entering into the Summa de Ec;clesiaitself it would be
well to note summarily the traces of this Mainz Proposition in
the later work:
1) The fundamental vision of Book II of the Summa is set
in the Nurnberg discourse as in the second part of the
Mainz work.
£) The first part of the Mainz Propositio represents a rough
framework for SE 109 and 110-the introductory ("Tanta soliditate ... ") and concluding (" ... quibus apertissima luce patet . . .") paragraphs are identical in both
works, except for modification to suit the particular oc7 " Tanta
soliditate veritatis apostolicum thronum, cuius nos oratores sumus,
domini et patres colendissimi, clemencia divinitatis fermavit, quod, ut sanctorum
patrum atestatur doctrina, iudicium eius in his, que fidei sunt, errare non possit.
Decebat sane, ut sedes ilia, que suprema dispositione consilii magistra fidei et cardo
omnium instituebatur ecclesiarum, in hiis que fidei sunt hominumque necessaria
saluti, ab ipso omnium auctore deo ... infallibilitatis munere iudicii donaretur ... "
Pacifico Massi, Magistero lnfallibile del Papa nella Teologia di Giovanni da Torquemada (Torino: Marietti, 1957), p. 165. The entire text of this first part is
carried here, pp. 165-176.

THE INFALLIBILITY

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247

casion; 8 the concept of infallibility (and citation of Lk
22) remains the cornerstone of the argumentation; and a
certain order of authorities quoted remains, though greatly expanded and placed within a different scheme in the
Summa de Ecolesia.
3) It is also worthy of note in the Mainz discourse, for our
discussion of the SE, that citations of Aquinas are present
but not central; 9 the argument from fittingness or suitability is alluded to but is not carried through the exposition; and the distinction of person and see with regard to
infallibility is made, but without any discussion of the
possibility of heretical pronouncements by a pope.
His mission in Germany completed, Torquemada went to
Florence to participate in the council of union. There he debated Cardinal Cesarini, now president of the council on Italian
soil, delivering his famous " Oratio Synodalis " defending the
primacy of pope over council, without recourse to the idea of
infambility. The remainder of 1439 witnessed the completion of
agreement on union with the Greeks in July, and the naming
of Torquemada a cardinal. A decade later his ideas on infallibility were presented in a more mature and developed manner
within the broad lines of the Summa de Eccliesia which we will
now trace.
The Summa is divided into four sections which already manifest Torquemada's concern with the church as a universal institution, its authorities, and its unity in faith. The four books are
entitled I) The Universal Church, 2) The Roman Church and
the Primacy of Its Pontiff, 3) Universal Councils and Their
Authority, 4) Schismatics, Heresies and Heretics. The guiding
vision of the work is clear in the first book. With his love for
great summaries, Torquemada refers to all the biblical images of
the church but unites them in the Pauline term Body of Christ.
In sketching the church according to this model, Torquemada is
able to express the human and divine aspects of the church.
•Introduction: Massi, p. 165; SE 109. Conclusion: Massi p. 175; SE 110.
0 ST II-II 1,10-Massi,
p. 169; Quodl. IX,6-Massi, p. 174.

248

EUGENE S. MORRIS

It is the visible congregation of believers which forms the Body
of Christ; they are this one Body only in Christ and animated
and governed by the Spirit through the " efficient cause " of the
sacraments. The hierarchy is only a further consequence of
this image-these ministries are the diverse members of the
Body of I Cor 12.10
In Book II the role of the pope is set within this universal
perspective. The bishop of Rome is the " Vicar of Christ," forming with Christ one head of the church. Thus, he is " episcopus
totius " with universal, full and supreme power over all believers. Torquemada in adopting the position separating jurisdiction and sacramental chracter can claim that all bishops receive
their jurisdiction immediately from the pope while still holding
the sacramental grace of ordination comes directly from Christ.
However, this centralized conception of authority in the church
(which seems so compatible with monarchy, Platonic philosophy-as well as the Pauline soma) is mitigated by several
important elements of this papal theology, all of which revolve
around the papal magisterium. Torquemada distinguishes between the powers of Christ and the pope: Christ's is" power of
excellence " while the pope only has " the fullness of ministerial
power, namely that which is necessary for the rule of the universal church, for procuring the salvation of the faithful." 11
Quoting Aquinas he makes it clear that even the pope can not
publish new articles of faith, abrogate old ones, institute new
sacraments, and so forth-all of which are Christ's powers. In
short, the papal primacy is limited in that the pope is tied to the
past in matters of faith. 12 Similarly, at the end of Book II
Torquemada presents his theory of the infallibility of the apostolic see as the consequence and necessary keystone to the entire papal theology he has constructed. In fact, this position
further delineates a concept of church and authority which is
Massi, pp. 22-23.
Juan de Torquemada, O.P., (Johannes de Turrecremata), Summa de Eccleaia
(Venice, 1561) II, 52; p. 166v. All references (hereafter SE) are to book, chapter,
and page of this edition.
12 Massi, pp. 54ff.
10
11

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249

far more subtle and traditional than the initial model of papal
supremacy would suggest.
This treatment of infallibility is organized roughly like the
1439 Propositio-through
extensive citations of Scripture,
Fathers, Gratian's Decretum, history and the Scholastics he
reinforces his fundamental assertion of the indefectibility in
faith and infallibility in judgment of the chair of Peter. This
time, however, he displays much deeper theological reasoning
and expounds further the elements of his position. Placed at the
end of the second book, the section on infallibility is presented
as a conclusion to Torquemada's papal theology; it is a conse·
quence of the general principles expounded previously as well
as the explanatory source of the traditional privileges of the
pope in essential matters of belief cited in chapters 107-108 and
within the section itself.
The title of chapter 109 clearly states the proposition of these
four chapters: " That the judgment of the apostolic see in
matters which are of faith and necessary for human salvation
cannot err." By way of defining this relatively new concept in
theology immediately, Torquemada calls it the privilegium and
munus of the apostolic throne of Peter by which God
strengthens it in truth and faith so that its judgments in matters
of faith cannot err. Repeating his words from the Diet of
Mainz he declares this privilege to be " fitting" for the chair
which has the office of " teacher of faith " and " 'hinge • of all
the churches." The language of the exposition manifests the
history of the discussion since many phrases are already fixed
by the fifteenth century. In the same way, his further explication of this infallibility is in line with the preceding theologians:
It is the indefectibility of the see which determines and defines
the Symbol of faith, declares errors and interprets the Scriptures, that is, the only see to which matters of faith, condemnation of errors, sacraments, canonization of saints, and interpretation of doubts pertain. 18
After the first description of infallibility in the introduction to
18

SE II, 110; p. 253v.

250

EUGENE S. MORRIS

109, Torquemada presents the first part of his proof-the
"authorities " which are grouped around two Gospel texts, Mt
16,18 ("You are Peter ... ") and Lk 22,32. He thus demonstrates that infallibility is a divine promise to Peter and his
successors. Mt 16,18 refers to the firmness of faith of the
apostolic see as much as to that of the church as a whole; Lk 22
establishes the indefectibility in faith or judgment of Peter.
Indefectibility in faith and infallibility in pronouncing a sentence in a dispute are identified. The second part of his proof
is by way of "reasons "-twelve syllogisms which comprise
chapter 110 and ten objections and responses (ranging from
important to relatively minor issues) in 111-112. These syllogisms really are a collection of assertions, proven by means of
multiple authoritative citations again, which point to the infallibility of decisions of the Roman Pontiff concerning the faith
-the judgment of the apostolic see never lacks in faith, no
depravity of men can extinguish this see's faith, its sanctions
are accepted always as the voice of Peter, and so forth. The
objections are various common objections to the papa.list stance.
Some are easily refuted, while others are much more treacherous, including several strong conciliarist positions. Having surveyed this exposition, we must ask if within this bare outline of
quotations there is a deeper logic which reveals the full theological import of this passage.
Papal Magisterium and the Unitas Fidei
As compared with the Mainz discourse, it is clear that the
present treatment of the infallibility of the papal office is shaped
by a more theological intrinsic logic and as a whole is a much
more nuanced presentation than the earlier work. Torquemada's argument is one of fittingness as indicated in his introduction. The demonstration has two principal parts, c. 109
and c. 110-112. The first part, from the authorities, establishes
the indefectibility in faith of the apostolic see from Mt 16 and
then poses as a consequence the infallibility of judgment of the
chair of Peter on the basis of Lk 22. Thus the inerrancy of papal

THE INFALLIBILITY

OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE

decisions is a consequence of the indefectibility in faith of the
church and its universal head on account of the promises of
Christ.
The second part is not simply a collection of citations or a
maze of reasons. Rather it is really one argument-that the
nature and role of the papacy in the church necessitates the
attribute of infallibility in its judgments. This is forcefully
presented in the first "syllogism" of c. 110:
The decision of that see which authoritatively determines and defines the Symbol, declares errors, and interprets the Scriptures must
be indefectible, since if these
doubtful or fallible it would be
very unsuitable and dangerous to Christian religion; but it is shown
(especially in c. 107-108) that it pertains to the apostolic see to
determine these matters; therefore, its decision in these matters can
not err.14
Torquemada is building upon the accepted-or at least previously established-roles or privileges of the bishop of Rome
which are shown to need the fundamental gift of infallibility to
make sense. This idea of suitability is further explained by reasoning regarding the act of believing, the assent of faith. Such
an act requires that there be no uncertainty in that to which
one assents
... for that which causes unvarying assent is necessarily so and can
not be otherwise. Similarly faith is necessarily that theological virtue to which falsity cannot be attributed, for faith leans upon the
First Truth, otherwise it would not make a firm and unchanging
assent.15
Thus, if there is the possibility that the apostolic see might err,
then no one could really believe in the various ecclesial expressions of faith without doubt and fear and so they would be
unfaithful and "many unseemly things would follow "-the
very nature and unity of the church would be shaken at the
foundations.
SE II, 110; p. 253v.
quod demonstratio quae causat assensum invariabilem est ex necessariis
et cui non possunt aliter se habere. Similiter fides virtus theologica est ex necessariis et cui non potest subesse falsum; quia innitur primae veritati alias non faceret
assensum firmum et invariabilem." SE II, 110; p. 252r.
14

15 " •••

EUGENE S. MORRIS

The other eleven syllogisms are treated not really as further
steps of reasoning, but as proven roles and attributes which
point to the munus infallibilitatis as the origin for the one reason proposed first. This is more a demonstration by " convergence" than systematic deduction; these things all reinforce the
necessity of the infallibility of the pope for the life of the church.
In the same way, the material of 111-llQ serves as a bundle of
facts which ensure the validity of the primary assertion, either
by countering objections or further clarifying the initial concept of the papacy.
This reasoning from a kind of convergence of suitability be-'
comes explicit again in the sixth and twelfth syllogisms of 110.
The tradition of referring all major cases of faith to Rome for
judgment is explained by infallibility on the basis of the principles established previously, since otherwise no definition by
the apostolic see would be held firm and without doubt and
thus schisms, heresies, and loss of faith would follow.10 Similarly, since God supplies everything necessary for the life of his
church (in accordance with Isaiah 5,4 " What is there I should
have done for my vineyard (the church) and did not do?");
and since faith is the foundation of all Christian religion, without which one cannot please God, it is necessary that God provide for the faithful troubled by questions of faith and heretical attacks "one known and certain tribunal in the church
of God to whose judgment and determination all must be
subject." 17
This intuition of a method of demonstration is further con16 " Quoniam sicut in disciplinalibus sit resolutio usque ad prima principia quae
falsa esse non possunt ita causae fidei referendae sunt ad thronum qui in iudicio
suo errare non potest; quia alias nihil diffinitum per apostolicam sedem aut terminatum teneretur firmum et indubitatum, et ita sequeretur schisma et haeresis inter
fideles et ita fides prima periret." SE II, 110; p. 254v.
17 " Cum impossibile est sine fide placere Deo
(Heb 11) et sit fides primum
fundamentum totius Christianae religionis ... Quoniam diversae questiones insurgunt et emergunt dubia inter fideles circa fidem et impugnationes haereticorum
necessarium fuit dare unum tribunal sive unum supremum iudicium notum et
certum in ecclesia Dei . . . cuius iudicio et determinationi omnes firmiter parere
deberent." SE II, 110; p. 256r.

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253

firmed by Torquemada's introduction to c. 112. He summarizes
clearly his proof: 1) Matters of faith pertain to the apostolic
see on account of its primacy; 2) Defining and interpreting
these matters cannot err by divine promise; 3) The reason being that otherwise the credibility of these established propositions concerning the faith would not be firm and without
doubt. This schema, unlike that of the Mainz document, immediately evokes much of the spirit and concepts of Thomistic
ecclesiology. We shall briefly discuss the positions of Thomas
Aquinas (1225-1274) and Guido Terreni (1270-1342) which
are related to this fifteenth century work.
Aquinas's renowned treatise on faith is the first seven questions in the Secunda Secundae of the Summa Theologiae. The
first question concerning the object of faith is significant for
Thomas's conception of the act of faith, the nature of the
church, and the role of magisterium, particularly that of the
pope. The assent of faith is an act of the person (though principally of the intellect, for Thomas) which through true propositions (such as the articles of a Creed) terminates in God Himself .18 Through true propositions we are in contact with God
the First Truth, the formal foundation of faith. This is
Thomas's insight of "faith as the beginning of vision." 19 It follows that now we need many articles to explicate and touch this
18 ST II-II 1,2 ad 2: " ... in symbolo tanguntur ea de quibus est fides in quantum ad ea terminatur actus credentis . . . Actus autem credentis non terminatur
ad enuntiabile, sed ad rem."
". . . the Creed expresses the things of faith as they are the term of the beHever's act ... Such an act does not have a proposition as its term, but a reality."
Blackfriars edition, Vol. 31, translated by T. C. O'Brien (London/N.Y., 1974), p.
13. All English citations of the Summa Theologiae are from this translation unless
otherwise indicated.
1 • ST II-II 1,2 ad 3: " ... visio patriae erit veritatis primae secundum quod in se
est secundum illud ' Scimus quoniam cum apparuerit, similes ei erimus, quoniam
videbimus eum sicuti est (1 Jn 3,2) .' Et ideo visio illa erit non per modum enuntiabilis, sed per modum simplicis intelligentiae. Sed per fidem non apprehendimus
veritatem primam sicut in se est."
" In heaven there will be vision of the first truth as he is in himself: ' When he
appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is'. Then, that vision will
not take the form of a proposition, but of a simple intuition. By faith, however, we
do not gaze upon the first truth as he is in himself." p. 15.

EUGENE S. MORRIS

one simple reality we hope to contemplate in heaven. Thus is
introduced an idea of developing explication of the Truth, the
possibility of new expressions of faith, new forms of the Symbol
unfolding particular aspects of the object of faith for a particular age and situation.
The Symbol is particularly important for faith since it expresses the truth of Scripture and meets the needs of the church
at a particular time. Indeed the Symbol expresses the very
nature of the church; it is the congregatio fidelium whose unity
is its unity in faith. The church is constituted by the gracegiven faith which unites believers to Christ and so to each
other. In pronouncing one profession of faith the entire
church speaks as if one person for they are united by their living faith expressed and actuated through the Symbol. 20
From the importance of true propositions for the act of faith
and the role of creed in the unity of the church Thomas proceeds to speak of the agency for revising and reformulating the
Symbol to preserve the integrity of believers' faith and thus the
unity of the church. Successive clarifications or determinations
of the articles of belief are" the task of the sancti (that is, the
Fathers), the Councils, the Popes ... It is always a case of
guarding the unitas fidei: a unity that extends through the
whole church, and also in its historic life going back to the
' Fathers ' and the Apostles." 21 The pope has the primary role
in this process as Thomas makes clear in article ten: the formulation of the Creed takes place at a general council, which
is convened only by the Supreme Pontiff.Z2 Here in placing the
councils under the pope Thomas has simply united the histori20 ST II-II 1,9 ad 3: " ... confessio fidei traditur
in symbolo quasi ex persona
totius Ecclesiae, quae per fidem unitur. Fides autem Ecclesiae est fides formata;
talis enim fides invenitur in omnibus illis qui sunt numero et merito de Ecclesia."
" In the creed the profession of faith is witnessed in the person as it were of the
whole Church, which is bound together through- faith. The Church's faith is a living faith, for such is the faith present in all those who are of the Church in name
and in life." p. 51.
21 Yves Congar, O.P., "St. Thomas and the Infallibility of the Papal Magwterium
S.T. II-II q.l, a.10" in The Thomist 38 (1974), pp. 85-86.
22 ST II-II 1,10 sed contra.

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cal fact that councils determined faith and formulated creeds,
and the fact that the Roman bishop determined and concluded
questions of faith. 23 He explains the reason for this:
The reason is that there must be one faith for the entire Church ...
this norm could not be followed unless every question arising out of
faith were resolved by the one having care over the whole Church,
whose decisions are therefom followed by the whole Church. 24

Cougar rightly comments that this flows out of the medieval
idea of representation and an organic vision of the Church as
indivisibly social and sacramental: " Theologically, the notion
of the pope being able, in certain stated cases, to incorporate,
to translate personally, the infallibility of the church implies
this sense of things." 25 He points out a further consequence of
this vision: " The thirteenth century did not set Council
against Pope; it saw them rather conjoining their authority;
that of the Pope had its proper origin, its supreme degree." 26
In the Summa Theologiae, then, Thomas presents a theology of
the papal function which is, above all, a concept of the "criteriology of faith viewed in its objective aspect, the content
and manner of achieving it." 27
Though only the universal church is described as inerrant
in faith in the Summa, Thomas does make the passage " from
the indefectibility of the Church to the expression of the
Church's faith by the universal and supreme public authority
that presides over the Church" in Quodlibetum IX (believed
to be authentic) .28 This work introduces a vague idea of a
Ibid., pp. 87-89.
• • quia una fides debet esse totius Ecclesiae . . . Quod servari non possit
nisi quaestio fidei de fide exorta determinetur per eum qui toti Ecclesiae praeest,
ut sic eius sententia a tota Ecclesia firmiter teneatur." ST II-II 1,10; p. 55.
25 Ibid., p. 95.
2 • Ibid., p. 92.
27 Ibid., p. 102.
28 Ibid., pp. 92-3 regarding Quodl. IX, 16: "It is certain that for the judgment
of the universal Church to err in matters of faith is an impossibility. Hence we
must stand by the decision of the Pope rather than the opinion of other men, even
though they be learned in the Scriptures. For he the pope has the right and duty
to determine concerning the faith, a determination he indicates by his judgment."
23

24 ".

Q56

EUGENE S. MORRIS

charism 0£ the papal office which ensures the truth 0£ his decisions; here Thomas even employs the example 0£ Caiaphas
who prophesied about Jesus's death because 0£ his office as High
Priest, though he was not conscious of what he said (Jn 11),
an example employed by both Guido Terreni and Torquemada.
Also significant for the future is Thomas's argument in the
Summa Contra Gentiles that Christ could not fail to assure
what was necessary to the church he loved, including a supreme authority to assure the unity of faith through definite
content of assertions and judgments-the argument from
fittingness. 29
In the fourteenth century Guido Terreni picked up the direction of these lines of Thomistic thought and formulated a
coherent theory of papal infallibility. Though the situation
which spurred the writing of this Quaestio was the various attempts to exalt the absolute primacy of a particular pope,
Terreni proposed the first explicit view of infallibility which included a theology of scripture and authority in the church. The
issue in either version of the Quaestio was stated as " whether
the pope may err in matters of faith " or " whether that which
a pope declares may be revoked and the opposite established
by his successor."
Terreni's multiple arguments are from fittingness: the inerrancy of the church requires an infallible pope; sure articles
0£ faith are needed for all to believe rightly and the church to
be united, therefore the Holy Spirit is given specially to the
Roman church; the authority of the church, epitomized in the
pope, approv;ed the canon of Scripture and the Creed, there·
fore the pope (in whom the authority of the church resides)
cannot err. In fact, the first reason mentioned above in Torquemada's c. 110 is taken virtually verbatim from Guido. 80
This presentation is rooted in the Thomistic understanding 0£
faith, the church, and magisterium seen already. 31 The pope is
••Summa Contra Gentiles IV, 76, 8.
••Guido Terreni, 0. Carm., Quaestio de Magiste-rio lnfallibUi Romani PontificM,
pp. 12-18.
ed. Bartolomaeus Xiberta, 0. Carm. (Muenster: Aschendorff,
81 Brian Tierney, Origins of Papal Infallibility
1150-1350 (Leiden: E. J. Brill,
p.
comments that the basis of Terreni's defense of papal power was a

THE INFALLIBILITY

OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE

still not seen as the source of episcopal authority or jurisdiction 82 but infallibility is claimed as the necessary consequence
of his magisterial role " that the unity of faith in all the faithful be served." 33 Thomas's authority is even cited for the application of Lk 22,32 to the pope and for the binding of the
pope to the past decision of the church. 34
Terreni has obviously retained the notion of papacy as
ministry of interpreting and explicating the Lord's revealed
truth:
It is not permitted to the supreme pontiff to establish anything contrary to what the Lord has said in the Gospel, for he is inferior to
the Lord. 35

The primacy of the pope is not arbitrary or absolute, but as
graced servant of the unique authority of Scripture as the one
source of faith:
... I plainly state and confess that .everything said or decreed contrary to the truth of faith or determined contrary to the doctrine of
sacred Scripture ... is to be rejected, refuted and revoked.

He then continues:
But in no way is it to be believed that God permits the Church to
err in faith or to decree or determine anything contrary to the faith
and the truth of divine Scripture, 36
" deep conviction that the Church of Avignon-with its pope, bishops, prelates,
palaces, laws, lands and revenues-was exactly the Church that Jesus Christ had
come among men to establish . . . the church itself was still holy because founded
on Christ."
• 2 Ibid., p. 268.
83 Terreni, p. 10.
84 Terreni, p. 10-11: "Igitur
secundum beatum Thomam non potest summus
pontifex . . . determinare, aut statuere seu facere constitutionem aliam fidem continentem et contrariam in fide ei quam predecessor fecit."
35 Terreni, Commentarium ad C. 25, q.1, c.6 fol. 169ra in Tierney, Origins, p.
259: "Quia contra ea que dominus in evangelio dixit_ non licet summo pontifici
cum sit inferior domino aliquid statuere . . . Interpretari quippe evangelium ad
sensum bonum et catholicum non contradicendo veritati fidei et scripture sancte,
hoc licet summo pontifici."
86 " ••• dico et confiteor plane quod omne dictum vel statutum contra veritatem
fidei et contra scripture sacre doctrinam determinatum . . . est repudiandum, refellendum et revocl!Jldum . . . Sed nullo modo est credendum quod Deus permittat

258

EUGENE S. MORRIS

which introduces the limit-case of heretical pronouncements by
a pope. Terreni does not admit that the Spirit who guides the
church would ever allow the pope to err. The pope in himself
may err, but God would keep him from publicly determining
anything against the faith " either by death, the resistance of
others, or in other ways." 37 And so the theory comes neatly to
its conclusion.
The work of these two theologians certainly shaped the
thinking of Torquemada on this issue. From the above we may
conclude that the line from the Dominican Thomas through
the Carmelite Guido contributes several major elements to
Torquemada's work on infallibility: 1) the Thomistic conception of the act of faith which is made through true propositions, 2) the importance of Symbols for the unitas fidei of the
church, 3) the need for a process of revising these expressions
with a guarantor of their certainty, the see of Peter, and 4) this
role of the pope along with the Thomistic allusions to papal
infallibility and its "fittingness " which are forged by Terreni
into a strong argument for the inerrancy of papal decisions.
(This is not to mention the many examples and citations
picked up by Torquemada as well as the explicit citation of the
pertinent passages from Aquinas and Terreni.) The examination of the internal logic of cc. 109-112 showed these elements
to be exactly those which guide the theological movement of
the whole treatment of infallibility.
What then is new in Torquemada's theory? Papal infallibility here is set within a complete and mature theological perspective (which it was not at Mainz), a perspective reflected in
its place in the whole of the Summa de Ecclesia. Along with a
real clarity in the tracing of the steps of the argumentation, the
reader can note a thoroughness in the compilation of evidence,
authorities, and explanations of common objections, all of
which is no doubt the result of a career of ecclesiological deecclesiam errare in fide ant statuere sen determinare aliquid contra fidem et veritatem scripture divine." Terreni, p. 27.
37 " ••• immo talem papam a suo malo proposito impediret Deus sive per mortem
sive per aliorum resistenciam sive per alios modos ut dictum est." Terreni, p. 28.

THE INFALLIBILITY

OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE

fl59

bate. In like manner there is a certain polemical tone to the
whole which is new to the discussion. This is seen in frequent
and detailed defense of the supremacy of a pope over and
against a general council with logical and historical arguments,
and in the rather exalted expressions with which the infallibility
of the Roman pontiff is first presented. Only later in the section does the concept become more nuanced. However, these
shadings are introduced, and they condition not only his concept of infallibility but also his entire model of church authority. They revolve mostly around two issues: how infallible decisions are made and the possibility of a heretic pope.
Significant Nuances
Up to this point we have neglected one element of an infallible decision as it is understood within the history of this
discussion; that is, we have omitted various allusions to the
role of the advice of others in the formulation of a papal sentence. From Cougar's work we have seen that in Aquinas the
pope is considered the fundamental and ultimate instance of
an authoritative re-elaboration of faith which includes councils, cardinals, bishops, theologians; indeed as president of the
council he fully acts as head and is able to " embody " the indefectibility of the church in his decision. Terreni inserts the
idea of consultation, at least with the cardinals, in the very
statement of his question. Basically he has retained the
Thomistic image of the organic relation between the indefectible faith of the church, the teaching of saints, the authority of
bishops and the papal magisterium within the one Body of
Christ: " ... wherever the supreme pontiff is gathered with the
college of lord cardinals or with a general council, in the name
of the Lord and for his faith, there is Christ." 38
Torquemada, conditioned by the conciliarist conflicts, is
tempted to lose this organic vision of the petrine office. This is
38 " •••
ubi summus pontifex cum collegio dominorum cardinalium sive cum
generali concilio congregantur in nomine Domini et pro fide eius, ibi est Christus."
Terreni, pp. 15-16.

EUGENE S. MORRIS

clear already in his treatment of papal primacy earlier in Book
II in which he has argued strongly for the papacy as source and
fullness of all potestas iurisdwtionis in the church. In this concluding section on infallibility he strategically drops any mention of consilium in the heading or introduction of his presentation in order to depict the apostolic see as that on which all are
built and which depends on nothing else (but the promise of
Christ) and to establish its authority distinct from that of
councils, cardinals, bishops and the like.
However, while asserting that the apostolic see is the privileged instance and exemplar of the indefectibility of the church,
the cardinal cites as an example the recognition of the canonical
books in the church in the introduction to c. IU (an example
used by Terreni as well). This example makes the point regarding the final determination of essential matters of faith by
the pope, but also implicitly indicates a relationship of the
papal decision to the living faith and tradition of the churches.
The canon is an important " test case " of his conception of
papal infallibility as the keystone of the arch of ecclesial authority which ensures the truth of the means (books of Scripture, Council decrees, theological writings, and so forth) by
which Christians believe in God. Here he states that the ecclesiastical authority placed most greatly in the bishop of Rome as
" head and ruler" of the church is hat which permits us firmly
to accept these books as inspired. The other such indication of a broader notion of papal decision-making is within
Torquemada's treatment of the sixth objection to the infallibility of papal pronouncements. Here he distinguishes quite
clearly the " apostle " and the .. apostolic see " and explains
this distinction by describing the formulation of definitions.
Infallible decisions are not understood as things done in private
or without consultation, rather they are those things which are
promulgated by the Roman pontiff who first " maturely and
gravely digests the counsel of wise men and a waximum number of lord cardinals." 89
••SE II,

ad 6; p. 116v.

THE INFALLIBILITY

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261

The second issue which tempers the papal theology of this
Summa is the case of the heretic pope. 40 Aquinas had not discussed such a case and had merely suggested in the Quodlibetum IX that the Holy Spirit could speak his truth even
though an unconscious or unworthy instrument. As Thomas
Izbicki has shown, Terreni carried his position on the divine
prevention of a heretical papal pronouncement into key texts
of his commentary on Gratian. In glossing the texts " Si papa,"
"Secundum ecclesiam," "Anastasius," "Nunc autem," and
" Haec est fides," Terreni explains away all the historical cases
and states simply that the pope can not publicly err because
God would somehow impede him from doing so. In glossing
the same texts in 1464 as well as in SE 112 Torquemada admits
that the pope can publicly err on the basis of the case of Anastasius, traditional canonistic concepts and the recent experience of the Western Schism. In this case the pope falls from
office and it is the duty of the cardinals, then the princes, and
finally the prelates to call a Council to declare this fact. 41 In
the Summa Torquemada expounds the assistance of the Holy
Spirit to the office of pope, then makes the point about consultation referred to previously, and then explicitly refutes
Terreni's position, giving his own explanation:
... if the Roman pontiff should fall into a condemned heresy, by the
very fact that he falls from the faith of Beter, he falls from the chair
and see of Peter and consequently a judgment made by such a
heretic would not be the judgment of the apostolic see. Thus his
judgment must be said to have no authority or importance, since
when he should fall from office through heresy, as a result he would
be deprived of the authority of judging. 42
' 0 SE II, 112 ad 6 and ad 7; cf. the same position in the Commentaria cited in
Thomas lzbicki, "Infallibility and the Erring Pope: Guido Terreni and Johannes
de Turrecremata" in Law, Church and Society: Essays in Honor of Stephen Kuttner, ed. K. Pennington and R. Somerville, (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania
Press, 1977), p. 103.
41 lzbicki, pp. 91-102.
•• ". . . si Romanus pontifex incideret in haeresim damnatam, et ita efl'ectus est
haereticus, ipso facto cadit a fide Petri, cadit a cathedra et sede Petri et per consequens iudicium quod faceret talis haereticus, non esset iudicium apostolicae sedis.
lmmo nee iudicium alicuius auctoritatis esset dicendum, aut momenti; quia cum

EUGENE S. MORRIS

He concludes the chapter explaining three cases of alleged papal
heresy.
In evaluating this material, Izbicki and Tierney both ignore
the principal theological reasoning we have noted in the work
of Torquemada and his two ancestors. Izbicki concludes:
Terreni's ideas wei;e too novel and daring for a traditionalist like
Turrecremata. Thus Terreni's doctrine of infallibility was not a
part of Turrecremata's legacy to subsequent generations of Catholic
ecclesiologists. 43

Tierney sees Ockham with his " two-source theory " contributing as much as Terreni to later papal doctrine and only briefly
mentions Torquemada's "somewhat muddled" theory of infallibility.44 Both appear to consider Terreni as having gone
after the goal of defending papal primacy with the wrong
means-and Torquemada even less coherently and successfully
than Terreni. 45 In doing so they pass over the great Thomistic
insights operative at the center of the two theologians' works.
The essential core of Terreni's position is passed on through the
" cautious," "conciliarist-tinged " Torquemada. In fact the
only major difference of the two is in the treatment of the limitcase of papal heresy, one of the key instances, we suspect, in
which Torquemada contributes important theological nuances
to the concept of papal magisterium which later in history was
expressed in a less subtle form.
Conclusion
The examination of Torquemada's theory of infallibility and
its comparison with the theology of Aquinas and Terreni has
uncovered a valuable core of insights into his work. He adopted
per haeresim cecidisset a praelatione, per consequens auctoritate iudicandi privatus
esset." SE II, 112; p. 260v; cf. Comm. ad C.24 q.l c.14).
•• Izbicki, p. 105.
44 Tierney, Origins of Papal Infallibility, pp. 270-271.
•• Izbicki, pp. 104-105: "The belief that a Pope, despite Providence, might become a public heretic vitiated much of Turrecremata's argument for papal infallibility. The office might be divinely guided, but there was no certainty that this
gift could be translated into unerring decisions."

THE INFALLIBILITY

OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE

268

the entire Thomistic vision of the confessional aspect of the act
of believing and of the unity of the Body of Christ. He then
developed indications in St. Thomas of a line of thought about
the role of magisterium, especially that of the bishop of Rome,
in preserving the unity of the congregatio fidelium. Further,
Torquemada, in spite of the polemical formation of his system,
had to confront the historical and canonical evidence about the
reality of the church, and so included important statements
about the counsel the pope must receive from the rest of the
church and about the possibility of a heretical pope. In these
he ultimately succeeds in moving his picture of the pope closer
to a more integral view of the papal ministry within the whole
of the church's hearing, living, and preaching of the Word of
God entrusted to her by Christ her Head.
Yet, in comparison with most earlier theologies, the presentation of the papal office in the Summa de Ecclesia does seem
less organic and corporate, and more open to an individualized
understanding of the office and so of its infallibility. Also, the
dynamic understanding of magisterium as an agency £or constant revision and renewal of formulations of faith, so clear in
Aquinas, has disappeared in Torquemada's ecclesiology. While
noting the worth of the technological structure which inspires
this treatment of infallibility, we must also be aware of the
danger of the polemical stress of this ecclesiology on the institution of the papacy and the loss of a concern for the progressive aspect of fidelity to the truth of faith. Both the values and
the dangers had repercussions in the history of this doctrine,
contributing to the problems of its interpretation.
In conclusion, however, it must be said that the value of
Torquemada's presentation is far more significant than its
weaknesses. Further, the importance of his contribution may
be seen by briefly considering: first, the role that his development of the Thomistic line of medieval thinking about the pope
and universal magisterium played in the later expressions of
papal infallibility and, second, the possibility that this work
could thus illuminate the present search for the meaningfulness
of these later statements.

264

EUGENE S. MORRIS

With regard to Torquemada's influence on the historical trajectory of this doctrine we may consider its crystallization in
the fourth chapter of Pastor Aeternus. The relatio of Bishop
Vincenz Gasser furnishing a broader theological framework for
the text and officially explaining key words within it is clearly
inspired theologically by the notions of the chair of Peter as
the center of the Church's unity in faith, and the infallibility
of papal judgments in matters of faith as the guarantee of that
unity. 46 The bishop explains this infallibility with a version of
the by-then-traditional argument from fittingness, presenting
the infallibility of the papal magisterium as necessary lest the
right belief and consequent unity of the church be imperiled. 47
He then explains the key terms personalis, separata, and
absoluta of the definition in a way which makes clear that infallibility is understood as a particular and special instance of
the whole of the church's handing on of revealed truth, that
which preserves the church in its essential unity.
Certainly Torquemada's thinking stands behind Gasser's
ecclesiological vision and argumentation here. Further study
would clarify the role of Torquemada's papalist synthesis in
the formulations of infallibility in the same line by Cajetan and
Bellarmine, who were more commonly read in the nineteenth
century and are explicitly cited by Gasser.
As for the contemporary search for a renewed understanding
of this element of the papal ministry, it is most significant to
note the convergence of ideas in ecumenical discussions, most
remarkably in the Lutheran-Roman Catholic U. S. A. Dialogue.48 The recent document on " Teaching Authority and Infallibility in the Church " manifests a growing mutual understanding of the means by which the truth of the gospel is faith46 The four-hour speech of July 11, 1870, is recorded by J. Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum Nova et Amplissima Collectio, Vol. 52, 1204-1230.
47 Mansi, Vol. 52, 1205.
48 Cf. Lutherans
and Catholics in Dialogue, 5: "Papal Primacy and the Universal Church " (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1974); and 6: " Teaching Authority and Infallibility in the Church" in Theological Studies 40 (1979),
pp. 113-166.

THE INFALLIBILITY

OF THE APOSTOLIC SEE

265

fully transmitted. The common statement presents the question as it is posed ecumenically today, within four broader
questions: the authority of the gospel, the indefectibility of the
church, the infallibility of the church's teaching, and the certainty which Christians associate with their faith. 49 After a
new biblical and historical investigation of infallibility within
this wider horizon, important convergences are related, despite
remaining differences of emphasis and a resultant inability to
agree fully on the issue. These instances of convergence between the two traditions draw a renewed picture of the historical and ecclesial nature of the means by which Christ preserves the saving truth of the gospel within the church. The
power of the Lord's Word in the gospel and the celebration of
the sacraments is expressed normatively in the Scriptures and
lives in its interpretation by the church through history guided
by the ministries of Word and sacrament, including a universal
ministry.
At the base of much of this convergence is the recognition of
the need for constant re-expression of the truth of the gospel
and for a means of ensuring continuity with its normative
formulations. Along with the appreciation of this need is the
affirmation of the church's ability, and indeed duty, to reformulate statements of the gospel message in different cultures and
ages.50 Though reached from a different direction (primarily
contemporary concepts of historicity and tradition) , the fundamental concern for the preservation of the integrity of the truth
is the prime concern already detected in Torquemada. The
••" Teaching Authority and Infallibility in the Church," paragraph 1, TS, p. 114.
50 " On the one hand with respect to the form in which the message is presented,
human language remains inadequate to the transcendent mystery of God and to
the fullness of the paschal mystery of Jesus Christ. On the other hand, with respect to the truth and certainty of the message, Christians trust that through their
Scriptures, their creeds, their conciliar definitions, and their confessional writings,
they are led by the Holy Spirit to the truth of the gospel and to an authentic life
of faith.
" The historical-cultural context of the Christian faith, which at times demands
reformulation of the church's teaching, makes it necessary for the church to develop structures concerned with the task of reformulation." Ibid., para. !'l6-!'l7; TS,
p. l!'l6.

266

EUGENE S. MORRIS

Dialogue's affirmation of the Spirit's guarantee of the indefectibility of the church's faith and preaching is the foundational
element of Torquemada's analysis of the papal magisterium in
the life of the church. However, the ecumenical discussion has
not fully explicated this basis of its statements about the interrelationship of Scripture, tradition, and teaching authority.
It would seem that the recognition that the church is "led
by the Holy Spirit to the truth of the gospel and to an authentic life of faith " through certain authoritative reformulations
of Christian faith could be further articulated in contact with
the splendid Thomistic explanation of the act of faith as touching God, the First Truth, through true propositions. The Dialogue could then really be enriched by the ecclesial consequences of this vision of faith drawn out by Aquinas and Torquemada: there is a real unity of faith at the depths of the
church's being, a unity which is the product of speaking one
creed " quasi ex persona totius Ecclesiae." Would this not lead
both parties to a deeper appreciation of the special service of
the Creed by the one with the place of Peter in the world mission of Christ's church? Such a consciousness of these rich
theological expressions about faith and the church in the Christian tradition may aid the formation of a more integral view
of the papal magisterium within an ecclesiology. Also, the recognition that these rich ideas were present at the center of the
historical formation of this doctrine, and that this development
was guided by the same concerns being voiced today may encourage a re-evaluation of the origins of infallibility and cast
new light on the real meaning of the Catholic doctrine. There
is good reason to hope that such study might deepen our sense
of the ways in which the Spirit guides the church's ministry of
the Word, and so hasten the day of full union of all who profess " One Lord, one faith, and one baptism."
EUGENE

North Ame?ican College
Rome, Italy

s. MORRIS

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

A

SPUTE OF long standing during the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries and one which flowed over into
most of the later middle ages was that concerning
the distinction between essence and existence in finite beings.
Aquinas had spoken of a real distinction between essence and
existence which he regarded not as two different things but as
two principles of being. Giles of Rome and Henry of Ghent
had each in his own way interpreted Aquinas's doctrine.
Thomas of Sutton (rn50-1315) in the eighth question of his
third Quodlibet took up the question and came down on the
side of Aquinas against both Giles of Rome and Henry of
Ghent. There is some question about how well Sutton understood the Thomistic position. His language does at times seem
to indicate that he regards essence and existence almost as two
things rather than two principles. But he also consistently
speaks of them as related as potency is to act. Gilson seems to
be correct when he states that there is no real reason to suppose that Sutton misunderstood the authentic position of
Aquinas, even though his language at times resembles that of
Giles of Rome. 1 F. Ehrle also is convinced that Sutton was a
bona fide Thomist whose doctrine was consistently in accord
with that of Aquinas. 2
Sometime later William of Ockham (c. 1300-1350) discussed
the matter in the seventh question of his second Quodlibet.
Ockham also attacked Henry of Ghent, but when he himself
came to solve the question, he firmly denied any real distinction between essence and existence. He saw them merely as
1 Gilson, E. History of Christian Philos<Yphy in the Middle Ages,
(Random
House, N.Y. 1955), p. 424.
2 Ehrle, F., S.J., "Thomas de Sutton sein leben, seine Quodlibet und seine Quaestiones disputatae," in Festschrift Georg von Bertling. (Kempten, Munchen, 1913),
pp. 426-450.

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J.

names or terms connoting the same singular reality from different aspects.
Each Quodlibet is a clear example of what can happen when
men of different metaphysical and epistemological approaches
consider the same problem and reject a common opponent.
The only point of agreement is the two-fold rejection of the
position taken by Henry of Ghent, while the conclusions
reached are absolutely contradictory to each other. This article
will examine how the different approaches led to those contradictory conclusions.3

I. Thomas of Sutton
Thomas of Sutton, born near Lincoln about rn5o, was an
early defender of the philosophy and theology of Thomas Aquinas. He was one of the Dominican Masters at Oxford. The
Quodlibet under consideration was written sometime after 1287.
The title of the question, the eighth of the third Quodlibet, is
whether there is a real composition of essence and existence in
created being. 4 His answer is in the affirmative. For the
essence of the creature which is created out of nothing does not
necessarily exist of itself. If it did, it would not need to be
created. Neither is it impossible for it to exist, for then it
would not be able to exist. Hence, it is of itself possible. If,
therefore, God should will that such a possible actually exist,
then either God must give Himself to that possible so that it
actually exist, or He must communicate to it some other actuality. But He could not do the first since then the Divine
Existence would be received and limited. Therefore, it is necessary that God impose upon it some other actuality through
which it becomes actual. It follows, then, that there will be a
real composition between essence and existence in the creature. 5
• This article is not intended to present a_ complete history of the problem, nor
to clarify the total position of either Sutton or Oclmam. It aims only to present
and consider the teaching of each author as it appears in the questions under
discussion.
• Thomas Von Sutton, Quodlibeta, Ill, 8, Verlag Der Bayerischen Akademie Der
Wissenschaften (Miinchen 1969) 390-397.
5 " Quia essentia illius creaturae, quae creatur
ex nihilo, non est de se necesse
esse, quia tune non indigeret creatione aut alia factione ad hoc, quod esset, nee

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

269

After listing several objections Sutton provides another argument which he says is a position taken by some great doctors.
It is an argument which he considers both true and necessary.
It runs as follows. Whatever is not of the intelligibility of an
essence enters into a real composition with the essence and differs really from the essence, if that factor is something real in
the being which also contains that essence. For no essence is
able to be understood without those notes which are parts of
the essence. But every created essence is able to be understood
without existence. For example, one is able to understand what
humanity means independently of the actual existence of men.
Hence, existence, since it is not of the intelligibility of the
essence, differs really from the essence and enters into a real
composition with it. 6
At this point Sutton turns to an objection posed by Henry
of Ghent. 7 Henry had argued that, if what is added to the understanding of an essence is something absolute over and beyond the essence, then it would be really distinct from the
essence. But if what is added is something relative, then this
something would not be really distinct from the essence but
only intentionally distinct, secundum intentionem. Now existence adds nothing absolute to essence but only a relation to an
efficient cause. It may be true that essence considered only in
itself says nothing but essence, but if it is considered in relation to the Divine Essence from which it proceeds as an effect,
then one can speak of an esse existentiae, an existential essence.
Henry does not mean that in this case existence is a relation,
est impossibile esse, quia tune non posset fieri. Ergo oportet quod sit possibile
esse. Si igitur Deus velit facere illud possibile esse actu, vel oportet quod Deus
imprimat se ipsum illi possibili, ut sic sit in actu, vel aliquam aliam actualitatem.
Primo modo non, quia sic esse divinum esset receptum et Iimitatum. Ergo oportet
quod imprimat essentiae aliquam aliam actualitatem, per quam ipsa sit in esse
actuali. Et sic erit ibi realis compositio essentiae et esse, et hoc per creationem."
Ibid., 890.
6 " Sed omnis essentia creata potest intelligi sine esse. Possum enim intelligere
humanitatem sine existentia aduali. Ergo esse, cum non sit de intellectu essentiae,
difl'ert realiter ab essentia et facit realem compositionem cum ipsa." Ibid., 891.
•Ibid., 891-892. See also Henry of Ghent, Quodlibeta Magistri Henrici Goetals a
Gandavo, III, 9 (Paris 1518).

270

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J.

but that the essence itself considered under such a relation is a
kind of existence. 8
Sutton finds the solution unacceptable. If existence is not a
relation, nor by its very intelligibility designates a relation, nor
anything absolute added to essence, then it must necessarily
be identical with essence. If one should take a given essence
like humanity, which includes in its intelligibility everything
which essentially belongs to it, then it necessarily includes
existence. Hence, humanity will not be properly understood,
unless it is understood as existing. But it is clear that humanity
can be understood without actual existence. There is no contradiction involved in saying that humanity does not exist. It
follows, then, that existence is not the same as essence, nor is it
anything necessarily pertaining to essence. Therefore, existence
must be something absolute added to essence.
It will not help, then, for Henry to say that essence can be
considered in itself apart from existence, but that existence is
only intentionally distinct from essence. For, if existence does
not designate something absolute nor relative, then it must be
radically identified with essence, just as animal is necessarily
included in man. Any essence, then, will participate in existence exactly in the same way as man participates in animality.
Once again it will follow that no essence can be understood as
not existing. Neither will it help to say that existence designates a relation of an essence to an efficient cause. Among all
the notes which belong to a thing existence is the most absolute.
Everything exists in itself before it can be related to something
else. Every such relation presupposes something absolutely
existing.
Others have sought to avoid the foregoing reasoning by making a distinction between the act of apprehension and the
judgment. In the judgment the intellect explicitly adds existence to essence, as when one says:_ " There are men," or " Man
exists." Nevertheless, in the act of simple apprehension by
8 ". • • non quod esse sit respectus, vel suo nomine dicat respectum, ut dicunt,
sed quod ipsa essentia, ut est sub tali respectu, est quaedam existentia." Ibid.

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

fl71

which the intellect grasps the meaning, man, existence is implicitly included, just as animality is also implicitly included.
Hence, they are identical. But this also will not work. Existence in act in nature is not signified except by the application
of the verb " is " or " exists." "Man " does not signify an
essence in act or actually existing. At best it signifies something indifferent to existence or non-existence. If" man" signified actual existence, then the proposition, " Man exists," would
be nonsense. It would be the same thing as saying, " The existing exists." It becomes still more obvious when the proposition is put into the negative. "Man does not exist " would
mean " The existing does not exist." Existence simply cannot
be included in essence if certain propositions are to retain any
meanmg.
In response to other objections Sutton continues to clarify
his position. Existence is not another predicament distinct
from both substance and accident. It is simply the actuation
of these and as such is reducible through what it actuates to
the same genus or species as these. 0 In the same way existence
is neither matter, nor form, nor the composite. It is the actuality of these principles which, until they are, are only potential principles. To another objection, which Ockham will bring
up later, that existence is related to essence as lighting is to
light, or running to a run, Sutton explains that the difference
is more than grammatical. The grammatical difference itself is
grounded in the metaphysical difference between any potency
and its actuation. 10
In the final part of the QMdlibet Sutton introduces an explanation of creation which apparently presupposes the real
• "Ad tertium dicendum quod ista divisio in substantiam et accidens est divisio
entis. Et eodem modo dividitur esse, quod est actualitas entis, scilicet in esse substantiae et esse accidentis." Ibid., 394.
10 "Ad quartum dicendum quod lucere non solum importat lucem nomine suo,
sed etiam esse ipsius. Et per consequens aliquid realiter differens a luce. Et similiter currere non solum importat cursum, sed ejus esse quod realiter differt ab eo,
sicut esse differt ab essentia. Et quamvis lucere derivetur a luce grammatice loquendo, non tamen oportet quod omnino idem significent lux et lucere, nee sapientia et sapere, nee ens et esse." Ibid.., 894-895.

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J.

distinction between essence and existence. In reality, as will be
seen below, the manner in which the argument is given destroys
creation instead of explaining it. The argument is worth consideration here because again Ockham will use it in his own
way. Sutton argues that there are those who speak of that
essence as possible which acquires reality through the creative
act. Thus existence must be really distinct from essence or
nothing would be produced in creation. But Sutton denies that
such an explanation can salvage creation. 11 In such a theory
essence seems to pre-exist creation as a potency pre-exists the
being which is produced, but, in point of fact, everything which
in any way enters into the composition of the created being is
produced along with it.
" When it is said that the essence of a creature does not exist necessarily nor is it impossible for it to exist, but possible for it to be, I
say that the essence of a creature before it is created is neither
necessary of itself nor possible of itself. It is not possible of itself
because it is nothing. Otherwise it would not be able to be created,
since creation is from nothing." 12

Hence, it is a false image which some make use of when they
state that in creation existence is imprinted on some essence,
just as in generation form is imprinted on matter. The truth of
the matter is that essence as well as existence are both produced together in the act of creation. Essence, which is always
of a certain kind, participates existence from a separated
source of existence. The only way in which existence can be
diversely multiplied is by being participated by diverse subjects. He makes it still clearer in the next response. When, for
example, it is said that existence is produced in a presupposed
essence, a distinction must be made. Essence is not presupposed as something prior to creation, but it is itself produced
as a term of the creative act. Both principles, essence as well
11

Ibid.

"Cum enim dicitur quod essentia creaturae non est neeesse esse nee impossibile
esse, sed possibile esse, dieo quod essentia ereaturae antequam creetur neque est
neeesse esse de se nee possibile esse de se, sed est non possibile esse de se, quia
est nihil. Alioquin ereari non posset, cum creatio sit ex nihilo. Ibid., 896.
12

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

fl73

as existence, are one term of creation, just as in generation form
and existence are one term of the process.18

II. William of Ockham
Ockham, born some fifty years after Thomas of Sutton, was
also at Oxford. He is, of course, better known for other positions he held in philosophy and theology, but he also considered
the question of the relationship between essence and existence.
His solution to the problem is perfectly in accord with his
epistemology and his view of material and immaterial singulars. It is with regard to immaterial singulars, or angels, that
he brings up the question of the distinction between essence
and existence.14 In the very beginning of the seventh question
of his second Quodlibet Ockham faces the solution proposed by
Henry of Ghent. One could hold the position that existence is
a relation of dependence of the creature on God. But this, he
adds immediately, is impossible. Such a relation would be
superfluous. An angel could exist without such a relation.
Ockham is not affirming that the creature could exist independently of God, although he did not think a causal dependence
could be demonstrated. What he is saying is that such a relation of dependence is not constituted by a principle of
existence either really or intentionally distinct from essence.
Furthermore, he had elsewhere denied 15 that relations were
realities distinct from substance. They were merely a certain
way of looking at one substance with regard to another. If, indeed, any substance was really dependent on God, then it was
so by reason of itself and not by reason of any superadded relationship. Henry of Ghent's position presupposed an inten18 " ••• quia non praesupponitur
essentia propter creationem, sed producitur
per creationem in esse tamquam terminus creationis, et ambo, scilicet essentia et
esse sunt unus terminus creationis, sicut in generatione forma et esse sunt unus
terminus generationis." Ibid., 397.
14 Guillelmus De Occam. Quodlibeta Septem, II, 7 (Strasbourg 1491).
15 Ibid., VI, !'ll; VII, I-fl. See also Expositio in Librum Praedicamentorum Aristotelis, ed. Gedeon Gal. Editiones lnstituti Franciscani, Universitas S. Bonaventurae
(St. Bonaventure, New York 1978), !'!38 ff.

274

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J.

tional distinction between substance and relation. Where there
is no such formal distinction but only a distinction of reason,
Henry's solution is simply not worth considering.
Following his rejection of Henry of Ghent Ockham proceeds
through all the various possibilities of a real distinction between essence and existence and rejects them all.
" I say with regard to this question that the existence of an ang,el is
not something different from its essence." 16

In the first place existence is not an accident of the essence.
This he thinks can be proved inductively .17 Existence is in the
order of substance. But it is neither the matter, nor the form,
nor the composite of both. Nor, as we have already seen, can
it be a relation of the substance to God. This would, in fact,
reduce existence to an accident of substance.
Over and beyond the difficulty mentioned above, still greater
difficulties would follow. For if the existence of an angel were
an accident of essence, the essence would be prior by nature to
its existence. Every substance is prior by nature to its accidents. And, therefore, it would be able to exist without that
accident. Further, everything which is hy nature prior to another God can make exist without that other. Therefore He
could make the essence of an angel exist without existence. 18
There are other objections to his position to which Ockham
next turns his attention. One argument for the real distinction
runs as follows. That which at one time is distinct from another is always distinct from that other. But the essence of an
angel was at one time distinct from the angel; namely, before
the angel existed. Therefore, it remains distinct from the existence when the angel actually is. Furthermore, what is indifferent to existence or non-existence is distinct from existence.
But the essence of an angel is such. Therefore, it must be dis16 " Dico ad istam quaestionem quod existentia angeli non est aliud ab essentia
sua." See n. 14 above.
17

Ibid.

omnem rem priorem naturaliter potest Deus facere sine posteriore.
Ergo posset esse essentia sine existentia." Ibid.
18 "

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

275

tinct from existence. Again, before an angel existed, it was
true to say that an essence is an essence, or an angel is an
angel. But it would not be true to say that an angel existed.
Therefore.
The argument can be pushed further. When an angel did not
exist, either existence was the same as the essence or distinct
from it. But it could not be identical with the essence since the
essence did not exist. Ockham finds no difficulty in responding
to the arguments.
" I say that the essence of an angel was never distinct from its existence, and it can even be admitted that existence was at sometime
not an essence. Just as the essence of an angel is never distinct from
itself, still the essence of an angel at one time was not an essence;
that is, when it was nothing." 19

To the argument that essence is indifferent to existence he
replies that existence itself can also be said to be indifferent.
For just as existence is able to be existence, so it is also able not
to be existence. So, too, essence is able to be essence or not to
be essence. One and the same thing is signified by one term
and consignified by the other. However, a distinction must be
made. For existence is sometimes a noun, and then it signifies
grammatically the same thing as essence. Sometimes existence
is a verb, and then it signifies verbally what essence signifies
nominally. Hence one term cannot be substituted conveniently for the other. For example, one can say: "Man exists," or
" Man is an animal." But one could not use " essence " in such
a proposition. The same is true of "run " and " to run."
Essence is said to be indifferent to existence only in so far as
each part of a contradiction is able to be true successively.
That, for instance, which is not now human may become so.
Ockham then returns to the prior objection. He denies that,
when an angel did not exist, it was true to say that an angel
was an angel, or that the essence of an angel was an essence.
19 " Dico ergo ad primum istorum quod essentia angeli numquam distinguebatur
ab ejus existentia. Et aliquando existentia non fuit essentia sicut essentia angeli
numquam distinguebatur ab essentia. Et tamen essentia angeli aliquando non fuit
essentia, quia aliquando nihil fuit." Ibid.

276

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J,

Prior to its existence an angel cannot be called a substance or
a being. All such propositions imply that an angel is an existing something.. Whenever, then, it is true that an angel is an
essence or a being, it will also be true that an angel exists.
Essence and existence signify the same thing. 20 It will also be
false to say that the existence of an angel is not the essence of
the angel, and, therefore, they are really distinct. The antecedent really denies that the angel exists, while the consequent
asserts that the angel exists. Hence, the consequence is invalid.
He ends the Quodlibet by denying again that there is any distinction between essence and existence. The only concession he
is willing to make is that existence and non-existence are able
to be predicated successively of a given essence.

III. Sutton and Ockham
It is almost impossible to make any meaningful comparison
between Sutton and Ockham since their conclusions about the
relation between essence and existence are derived from different metaphysics and different epistemologies. Sutton sees
reality from a Thomistic viewpoint in which a material being is
structured by principles which are related to each other as potency and act. Essence is the potency which receives existence,
is actuated by it, and in turn limits it to this particular kind of
being. There is for him a real distinction between such principles, and he does not require separability to affirm it. It is
sufficient that one principle is not the other, that the potential
can never be identified with the actual, for him to hold a real
distinction. As a result, he can clearly distinguish the created
from the uncreated, the contingent from the necessary, the actual from the possible. His first argument flows directly out of
that metaphysics.
•• " Unde idem omnino significatur per unum et consignificatur quod per reliquum. Tamen esse quandocumque est nomen. Et sic tune significat omnimodo
grammaticaliter et localiter idem quod essentia. Aliquando est verbum; tune idem
significat V'erbaliter quod essentia significat nominaliter. Et ideo unus non ponitur
eonvenienter loco alterius, quia non habent eadem officia. Sicut nee nomen, nee
verbum." Ibid.

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

Ockham, on the other hand, always insisted on. the uniqueness of the singular existent, and his theory of knowledge takes
its origin from there. As a matter of fact, he had made this
singular so unique and absolute that all knowledge of it, with
the exception of a direct intuition, was bound to reflect that
singular as complex only in the various approaches the intellect could take toward it. Existence itself was a seal on the
singular's uniqueness, and he rejected any attempt to introduce
any sort of Platonic plurality into it. All the predicaments except quality were reduced to the reality of substance and were
only the diverse ways the intellect could understand a unique
reality. He can do very little with causality except reduce it
to an experiential conjunction of two such singulars. Hence,
for Ockham a real distinction always implies separability. This
separability may be natural, as between two things, or possible,
at least by the absolute power of God. This absolute power is
limited only by the principle of contradiction, and Ockham in
the arguments he has presented obviously sees a separation of
essence and existence as a contradiction in terms.
Nowhere is this more evident than in his reaction to the second argument proposed by Sutton. Sutton had argued that,
where one principle does not include the other in its intelligibility, they must be really distinct. But existence is not included in the concept of essence. Therefore, they must be
really distinct. He could expect it to be difficult to convince
Ockham with that argument. Ockham sees no need to take
what are various attempts to understand a thing and impose
them on that thing, as if the thing itself were so structured. Let
the singular alone in its singularity! And let knowledge do its
thing, which is to clarify, expand, and handle as best one can
that primary intuition of existent singulars. To do otherwise
would be to return to the Platonism which _Ockham had so consistently rejected in Scotus. Ockham's theory of intellectual
cognition is both more realistic and less so than Sutton's. On
the one hand, it affirms a direct intellectual grasp of the singular existent. But once one has abstracted from such a direct
intuition, the intellect can only concern itself with diverse ways

278

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J.

of dealing with such a singular. The distinctions are all on the
side of knowledge and reflect no pluralistic structure in the
thing itself.
The opposing views become still more clearly pronounced
when creation is considered. Each has something to say about
it in the questions under discussion. And each follows with a
more specialized inquiry in the question immediately following
in the same Qiwdlibet. 21 Thomas of Sutton argues that, unless
one holds the real distinction between essence and existence,
creation is impossible. For Sutton, if one identifies essence with
existence, then existence is just as integral to the meaning of
man as is animality. And just as a man is necessarily animal,
so man necessarily exists. And to make the proposition, "Man
does not exist," then becomes a contradiction in terms. He next
attempts to forestall the objection that in that case essence preexists itself by making a distinction. In one sense it can be said;
that is, in so far as essence always existed as a Divine Idea in
the Divine Intellect. But there it is identified with God and
is the exemplar of the finite being which is the term of the
creative act. He makes it clear that the essence as finitely existing does not pre-exist the being of the creature. In this case
both essence and existence are the term of creation. He in fact
criticizes those who would explain creation as the actuation of
pre-existing potency. This would, indeed, be subject to objection and would invalidate what is meant by creation. The only
potency prior to creation is in the potentia creativa of God
Himself. On the created level both essence and existence, in
other words, the whole being of the creature is produced simultaneously. This clearly differentiates creation from generation.
Ockham never quite faces the above distinction. As we have
seen, he simply argues that, if an essence is always itself, then
it is necessarily eternal. The difficulty, as he sees it, lies in our
being able to talk about an essence independent of existence.
This is a false image. Such an essence would literally be noth:ing. Hence, possible essences really do not mean anything.
21

Thomas of Sutton (n. s above) III, 9. William of Ockham (n. 14 above) Il, 8.

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

fl79

Their possibility is at best an ens rati-onis which the mind conceives by abstracting from existing particular essences in experience. Neither can he explain their possibility by reference
to the Divine Ideas as patterns for creation. He had agreed
with Augustine that there were such ideas, but he refused to
place them in the Divine Essence. This would have violated
the absolute simplicity of that Essence. Neither could he place
them outside the Divine Essence without going back to a Platonic position. This would in turn have made God dependent
on intelligibilities distinct from Himself and would have made
a free creation impossible. There was only one thing he could
do, and that was to identify a Divine Idea with the possibility
of the creature. Such an Idea became, then, simply a connotative term signifying the creature as possible and God as cause. 22
It is precisely because of this that Ockham cannot admit Sutton's distinction. If the possibility of the creature lies in the
creature itself, then to make such a possibility even logically
prior to the creature is to place in the created order some semireality which is anterior to creation. This would be to deny
creation and reduce it to generation. Hence the possibility of
the creature must be recognizable only subsequent to creation.
Before that it is nothing. Again, it is Ockham's metaphysics
which dictates his position on the relation of essence to existence.
There is, however, a difficulty in Ockham's position which,
I think, Sutton is able to avoid. That difficulty concerns the
22 " Dico quod
ista descriptio non convenit ipsi divinae essentiae, nee alicui
respectu rationis, sed ipsaemet creaturae."
Again: "Ideae non sunt in Deo subjective et realiter, sed tantum sunt in ipso objective tamquam quaedam cognita ab ipso, quia ideae sunt ipsaemet res a Deo
producibilia. . . . Ideae sunt primo singularium et non specierum quia praecise
singularia sunt scibilia."
And again: "Idea importat ipsammet creaturam in redo et etiam ipsammet in
obliquo et praeter hoc importat ipsam divinam cognitionem vel cognoscentem in
obliquo; et ideo de ipsamet creatura est praedicabilis ut ipsa sit idea, sed non est
praedicabilis de agente cognoscente, quia nee cognitio nee cognoscens est idea,
sicut nee exemplar." William of Ockham, In I Librum Sententiarum, d. 85. 5 D fl'
(Opera Theologica, V. 1, Editiones Instituti Franciscani, Universitatis S. Bonaventurae, (St. Bonaventure, New York 1967).

280

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J.

unity of the existing singular, which Ockham was so fond of
asserting. For Sutton it is not a problem. The material principle in material beings is in potency to form and is actuated
by form to be a certain kind of matter. But this composition
is itself in potency to a higher act and is capable of being actualized only through the principle of existence which is applied
to the composite. Hence, there is one act of existence fl.owing
through form to matter making the essence an existing essence
and one unique reality.
It is more difficult for Ockham. As we have seen, he did not
think creation could he adequately explained if anything, even
a pure potency, pre-existed the creative act. He could not,
then, admit matter as a pure potency. Matter itself had to be
created; therefore, it was of itself a created reality. Its potentiality was a secondary one in relation to all the forms it could
receive. Since it was a reality in its own right, God, at least
by His absolute power, could cause it to exist without form.
Form and matter, then, are really distinct by reason of their
separability. 23
Nor does it stop there. There were theological considerations
which led him to posit a plurality of forms, especially in the
human existent. There had to be a form of corporeity, since
after death, when the spiritual form of man had departed, what
remained was recognized as materially human, at least for a
time. Furthermore, how could the numerical unity of the
risen body of Christ be maintained, unless such a form of
corporeity remained while Christ was in the tomb? Then, too,
the sensitive form of man seemed to be different from his intellectual or spiritual form. And such a form did exist in its
own right in animals.
He is speaking of more than principles of being here. Matter
is a reality. The form of corporeity is a reality. The spiritual
form is a reality distinct from both. For how else could the soul
of man exist apart from the body? Ockham is faced with at
23 William of Ockham, Summulae
Physicorum, I, 16 (Philosophia Naturalis
Guillelmi Ockham, Rome, 1637) .

TWO QUODLIBETS ON ESSENCE/EXISTENCE

281

least three distinct and separable realities all coming together
to form the singular unity which is this man. This is undoubtedly the reason why he never tried to locate the principle of
individuation either in matter or form. As a matter of fact, he
simply states that individuality needs no explanation. The
singular existent is individual because it exists. 24 It is a fact to
be accepted, not to be explained. But it remains a difficulty.

IV. Conclusfon
Thomas of Sutton and William of Ockham represent two approaches to a problem which would concern philosophers and
theologians for centuries. It was a problem which remained a
stumbling block to the different schools of thought. For whatever solution was proposed, that solution was grounded in a
view of the metaphysical structure of reality and the extent to
which the human intellect was capable of understanding it.
Sutton is more realistic than Ockham in this respect. But
Ockham, despite his concern with logic and the supposition of
terms, never surrendered a basic realism. The singular is always there and a.ble to be grasped in its existential, sensible
reality. He is less willing than Sutton to assert the reality of
distinctions which intellect can make about the real, preferring
to consider them as attempts made by the intellect to deal from
various viewpoints with a real which is radically singular.
Where he is willing to admit composition in such singulars, he
does so mostly because he is driven to it by the pressure of
theological positions he had accepted on faith. Sutton is much
more willing to let philosophy do its work, and he could find in
it a much greater certitude than Ockham was ever able to
admit. For Sutton philosophic reason affirmed distinctions in
the real because it found them there.
24 " Ideo dico aliter ad quaestionem. Et primo ostendo istam conclusionem quod
quaelibet res singularis se ipsa est singularis. Et hoc persuadeo sic: quia singularitas
immediate convenit illi cujus est; igitur non potest sibi convenire per aliquid aliud:
igitur si aliquid sit singulare, se ipso est singulare." Quoted from Gordon Leff,
William of Ockham (Manchester University Press, Manchester 1975) 119, footnote

20(;1.

HARRY R. KLOCKER, S.J.

The intensity of the dispute is lost on contemporary philosophers mostly because the realism of the fourteenth century has
long since been rejected. Descartes taught philosophers that
the proper object of philosophic reason was mind and not
things. They learned that lesson well. Locke and Hume, for
all their attempts to return to experience, never got beyond
impressions, sense data, and ideas. Nor did Kant help with his
emphasis on the intellectual categorizing of those same impressions. Meaning instead of reality became and remains the object of the philosophic enterprise. If ever contemporary philosophy looks beyond its own quarrels about meaning, sense
data, and the function of terms in propositions, it may once
again approach the real source of all these. And if it ever does
that, it cannot avoid the thinkers of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

HARRY R. KLocKEn, S.J.
Marquette University
Mil,waukee, Wisconsin

NEWMAN STUDIES: RECENT RESOURCES
AND RESEARCH

D

URING HIS LIFETIME, John Henry Newman captivated the attention of a multitude of readerssimultaneously attracting admirers and antagonizing
adversaries. For example, Maria Pusey (the wife of Edward
Pusey, Newman's onetime colleague in the Oxford Movement) once remarked:
... there are some things that come to one as truth as soon as they
are proposed, and those are the things one really believes unhesitatingly. Mr. Newman's ... sermons are full of truths of [this] sort,
and perhaps that is one reason why I so like them. 1

In contrast is the animosity that prompted Newman to write
his Apologia Pro Vita Sua in reply to Charles Kingsley's gratuitous insult:
Truth for its own sake has never been a virtue of the Roman clergy.
Father Newman informs us that it need not, and on the whole ought
not, to be; that cunning is the weapon which Heaven has given the
saints wherewith to withstand the brute male force of the wicked
world which marries and is given in marriage. 2

Such reactions are characteristic; as David DeLaura has
observed:
Newman is in fact the one nineteenth-century figure most difficult
to discuss dispassionately. His persuasive power is still felt to be
either a flagrant danger or a rich source of wisdom.3
1 Marvin O'Connell, The Oxford Conspirators, A History of the Oxford Movement, 1833-1845 (New York: Macmillan; London: Collier-Macmillan, 1969), p.
217. O'Connell's book, with its detailed explanations of Oxford University practices
and procedures in the nineteenth century, furnishes a _helpful background for understanding Newman's role in the Oxford Movement.
•Susan Chitty, The Beast and the Monk: A Life of Charles Kingsley (New
York: Mason/Charter, 1975), p. 229.
8 D. DeLaura, "Newman's Apologia as Prophecy," in DeLaura's edition of Newman's Apologia Pro Vita Sua (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1968), p.
498.

288

JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

De Laura's appraisal has validity, not only in the area of biography and literary criticism, but also in relation to Newman's
philosophy and theology.
During his lifetime, Newman's theological views were often
considered deceptive, if not dangerous. While he was at Oxford, his theological positions were frequently disowned by his
fellow Anglicans; indeed, Kingley's acerbic criticism, coming
nearly two decades after Newman's conversion to Roman
Catholicism, is an indication of deeply rooted suspicions about
his theological integrity. Yet Newman's theological reputation
fared little better as a Roman Catholic; his theological endeavors were puzzling, if not suspect, as far as most professional theologians were concerned; in fact, his orthodoxy was
long in question at the Vatican. 4
The Anglican rejection of Newman's efforts to re-catholicize
the Church of England is readily understandable as a Protestant reaction against "Romanism." More puzzling, however,
are Roman Catholic hesitations about Newman's theological
inquiry. First of all, Newman's way of theologizing, relying on
an analogical, historical process of reflection, differed radically
from the systematic, speculative approach then coming into
vogue in Roman Catholic circles. In effect, this divergence was
sort of a methodological "generation gap," resembling the different orientations in Roman Catholic theology before--in contrast to after-Vatican Il. 5 Moreover, Newman's deviation
from the then conventional theological mainstream was interpreted by ecclesiastical authorities as haughty at best, if not
heretical at base. Yet Newman's theological alienation was not
merely an ecclesiastical quarrel:
Above all, the conflict was between a patient, deeply inquiring mind
that wanted undecided questions left open and an impatient, intolerant spirit that regarded open questions as untidy, to be turned
•Details on one instance are given by Vincent Biehl, "Newman's Delation," The
Dublin Review 234/486 (Winter, 1960-61), 296-305.
•Wolfgang Klausnitzer, Piipstliche Unfehlbarkeit bei Newman und Dollinger, Ein
historisch-systematischer Vergleich, lnnsbrucker theologische Studien 6 (InnsbruckVienna-Munich: Tyrolia, 1980,) pp. 203-215.

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

as soon as possible into static formulas that could be imposed as
matters of faith.8
Accordingly, it is not surprising that Newman opposed the
rising tide of ultramontane theology that looked to Rome for
dogmatic answers to any and every theological question; W. G.
Ward personified this attitude in his reported desire to have
an infallible papal pronouncement each morning at breakfast
along with his copy of The Times.7 Similarly, it is not surprising
that Newman, sensing that his own approach to theology was
quite different from the methodology acknowledged by most
professional theologians, sometimes even denied that he was a
theologian. 8
It was only at the end of Newman's life that the lingering
doubts about his orthodoxy were effectively dispelled by the
conferral of the cardinalate.
His elevation was a providential vindication of all he stood for. He
could no longer be called ' half a Catholic ', or ' unsound ', or the
preacher of' a mutilated form of Catholicism '.9
Shortly aJter Newman's death, however, suspicions of heterodoxy were resurrected when modernist writers misappropriated
his writings for their own devices. For example, " George
Tyrrell certainly saw Newman as a forerunner of his own particular views; and Tyrrell was not the only one to maintain
that, when modernism was condemned, Newman was condemned with it.''1°
• J. Derek Holmes, Robert Murray (editors), On the Inspiration of Scripture by
John Henry Newman (Washington, D.C.: Corpus, 1967), p. 40.
1 On the development of ultramontanism, see J. Derek Holmes, More Roman
than Rome: English Catholicism in the Nineteenth Century (London: Bums &
Oates; Shepherdstown: Patmos, 1978); Richard Costigan, Rohrbacher and the
Ecclesiology of Ultramontanism, Miscellanea Historiae Pontificiae 47 (Rome: Universita Gregoriana, 1980); Hermann Pottmeyer, Unfehlbarkeit und Souveriinitat,
die piipstliche Unfehlbarkeit im System der ultramantanen Ekklesiologie des 19.
Jahrhunderts, Tiibinger theologische Studien 5 (Mainz: Griinewald, 1975).
8 See.Nicholas Lash," Was Newman a Theologian?" Heythrop Journal 17 (1976),
822-825.
•Charles S. Dessain, John Henry Newman (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons,
1966; London: Adam & Charles Black, 19719 ), p. 165.
10 H. Francis Davis, "Newman's
influence in England," The Rediscovery of

286

JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

Again, Newman's theological reputation was restored by
papal recognition; in a letter to the Bishop of Limerick, who
had written a pamphlet defending Newman from the accusation of modernism, Pius IX noted:
... Newman always defended the cause of the Catholic faith before
the English public, so that his work was both a great benefit to his
fellow-countrymen, and held in high esteem by our predecessors .
. . . Indeed, though things might be found which appear different
from the usual theological mode of expression, nothing can be found
which would arouse any suspicion of his faith .... n

Although such papal approbation vindicated Newman's orthodoxy, it could hardly preserve his different mode of theological thought from misinterpretation by " writers, who were too
inclined to measure him by a scholastic yardstick and to impose on him alien categories. 12
In effect, during the first half of the twentieth century, Newman's theological insights were partially deflected and occaionally debased through the well-meaning but undiscerning
appropriation of scholastically trained theologians. Consequently, by the time of Vatican II, it was evident that Newman
needed to be read in his own terms, if his theological portrait
was to be restored. 13
This increased scholarly interest in Newman is related to a
broader recontextualization in Roman Catholic theology; during the past two decades, the once predominant neo-scholasticism has increasingly had to share the stage with a theological
pluralism whose common characteristics can be described as:
biblically based, historically conscious, experientially grounded,
and eumencially concerned. Since these same traits are also
Newman: an Oxford Symposium, edited by John Coulson and A. M. Allchin (London-Melbourne: Sheed and Ward; London: S.P.C.K., 1967), p. 217.
11 H. Francis Davis, "The Catholicism of Cardinal Newman," John Henry Newman: Centenary Essays (London: Burns, Oates and Washbourne, 1945), p. 89.
12 Charles S. Dessain, "Newman's
Philosophy and Theology,'' Victorian Prose:
A Guide to Research, edited by David DeLaura (New York: Modern Language
Association of America, 1978), p. 170.
13 See J. Coulson, A. Allchin, Newman: a Portrait Restored (London/Melbourne/
New York: Sheed and Ward, 1965).

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

hallmarks of Newman's theology, there is a fascinating resonance between Newman's insights and current theological concerns. Newman, of course, can not be expected to provide
ready-made answers to today's questions; however, he was
gifted with a proleptic discernment into theological problems
that were faintly surfacing in his day and have since emerged
as critical issues. In effect, Newman's writings provide a framework of meaning and a method for contemporary theological
investigation.
Scholarly examination of Newman's thought has been catalyzed by the publication of a number of research tools. For
example, less accessible works, such as On Consulting the
Faithful in 1lf atters of Doctrine, 14 A Letter to the Duke of Norfolk,15 and On the Inspiration of Scripture, 16 have been republished; critical editions of the Apologia Pro Vita Sua 17 and
The Idea of a University 18 have appeared; a catalogue of the
works which Newman published during his life has become
available. 19
Archival Materials
Simultaneously, study of the development of Newman's
thought has been facilitated by the publication of his philosophical and theological manuscripts 20 and his correspondence.
"Edited by John Coulson (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1961).
Edited by Alvan Ryan in Newman and Gladstone: the Vatican Der:rees
(Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press,
16 Cf. note 6.
17 Edited by Martin Svaglic (Oxford: Clarendon, 1967).
18 Edit·ed by Ian Ker (Oxford: Clarendon, 1976) .
19 Vincent Biehl, John Henry Newman, A Bibliographical Catalogue of His
Writings (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1978).
2 • The Philosophical Notebooks of John Henry Newman,
volumes, edited by
Edward Sillem (Louvain: Nauwelaerts, 1969-70).
The Theological Papers of John Henry Newman on Faith and Certainty, edited
by Hugo de Achaval and J. Derek Holmes (Oxford: Clarendon, 1976) .
The Theological Pape:rs of John Henry Newman on Biblical Inspiration and on
Infallibility, edited by J. Derek Holmes (Oxford: Clarendon, 1979).
Newman the Oratorian, his unpublished Oratory Papers, edited by Placid Murray (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan/Westminster, Maryland: Christian Classics,
1969).
10

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JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

The Letters and Diaries of. John Henry Newman pertaining to
his Roman Catholic period (1845-90) have already appeared
(volumes XI-XXXI); the material from his Anglican years to
the beginning of the Oxford Movement has recently become
available.
The first volume of Newman's Letters and Diaries 21 includes
such diverse items as letters written to his parents while he was
at boarding school at Ealing, journal entries which reveal his
strenuous schedule as a student at Trinity College, and the
essays he submitted in his successful effort to gain the prized
Oriel fellowship. As autobiographical, this volume furnishes a
fascinating vignette of Newman's family, both in times of happiness and in the straightened circumstances following his
father's bankruptcy; one can also glimpse Newman's search for
friends among a student body whose interests were not always
as academic as his own.
Simultaneously, one can detect the initial stages in the evolution of his religious convictions and theological views; for ex·
ample, in writing to his sister Jemima, Newman envisioned a
book that would " trace the sources from which the corruptions
of the Church, particularly the Romish, have been derived"
(I; Q85) -this project came to fruition nearly two decades
later, in a way that Newman could hardly have anticipated, as
An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. Similarly, in a series of letters to his younger brother Charles, who was
beginning what proved to be a life-long alienation from Christianity, Newman proposed arguments that foreshadowed positions that would be enunciated forty-five years later in the
Grammar of Assent.
The second and third volumes of The Letters and Diaries of
John Henry Newman 22 cover the half-dozen years prior to John
21 The Letters and Diaries of John Henry Newman I: Ealing, Trinity, Oriel;
February 1801 to December 181!6. Edited by Ian Ker and Thomas Gornall (Oxford: Clarendon, 1978), £18.50. References to the Letters and Diaries will be given
within the text to the volume, in roman numerals, and to the page, in arabic
numbers.
22 Volume II, Tutor of Oriel, January 181!?' to December 1831, and Volume III,
New Bearings, January 1831! to June 1833, edited by Ian Ker and Thomas Gornall

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

289

Keble's Assize Sermon on "National Apostasy," which Newman "ever considered and kept the day [July 14], as the start
of the religious movement of 1833." 23 For Newman, these
transitional years were a time of political activity, professional
achievement, and intellectual advancement.
Newman's political successes were somewhat pyrrhic. For
example, in protest against Sir Robert Peel's support of" Catholic emancipation," Newman participated in the campaign that
led to Peel's defeat as member of Parliament for Oxford; Peel,
however, was promptly returned to the House of Commons
from another consistuency. Even more ironic was Newman's
support of Edward Hawkins, in preference to Keble, in the election of a new Provost of Oriel College; little more than two
years later, Newman and Hawkins were at loggerheads. Their
point of contention was the role of college tutors; Hawkins considered the position pedagogical, while Newman viewed the office as pastoral. In fact, Newman, in consort with two of the
three other tutors, had revised the tutorial system without consulting Hawkins; in the ensuing controversy, Hawkins insisted
on his administrative prerogatives, while Newman defended his
ministerial principles. In their correspondence, the Provost's
stance appears more correct, and the tutors' self-defense more
contrived, than biographers of Newman have generally allowed. In any case, Hawkins refused to assign any more pupils
to Newman, who acquiesced in this" gradual mode of removing me" as tutor.
The deprivation of the Oriel tutorship proved to be a disguised blessing. Newman, gradually relieved of the onus of
tutoring undergraduates, had more time to pursue his
pointed task of reading the Fathers of the Church in chronological order and to work on his first book, The Arians of the
Fourth Century (1833) . The loss of tutorial responsiibilities also
enabled Newman to accompany Hurrell-Froude, one of the
other displaced tutors, on a Mediterranean cruise in the winter,
1832-33.
(Oxford: Clarendon, 1979, £il0.00 and £18.50, respectively; New York: Oxford
University Press, 1979, $58.00 and $49.95, respectively.)
28 Apologia Pro Vita Sua (New York: Norton), p. 41.

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JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

During the course of their voyage, Newman and Froude
visited Rome. Four years earlier, Newman had acknowledged
that he was " clearly in principle an Anti-Catholic," since he
was convinced that " infidelity and Romanism are compatible,
or rather connected, with each other,, (II, 132; cf. II, 123 and.
128) . His tour of Rome in 1833 made him " more attached
than ever" to the Catholic system, while still detesting its
Roman claimant (II, 273) ; nonetheless, his feelings seem to
have been ambivalent:
Oh that Rome were not Rome; but I seem to see as clear as day
that a union with her is impossible. She is the cruel Church-asking
of us impossibilities, excommunicating us for disobedience, and now
watching and exulting over our approaching overthrow (III, 284).

Newman, for several years, had been apprehensive that " the
stream of opinion is setting against the Church" (II, 130); his
immediate concern was the government-sponsored Irish Church
Reform Bill, which provided for the reduction of the number
of Anglican dioceses and parishes in Ireland. To its Whig proponents, the reform measure was eminently pragmatic: it reduced expenditures for ecclesiastical institutions in places where
the Church of Ireland had little or no following and where its
support antagonized the predominantly Roman Catholic populace. To Newman, however, such governmental interference in
the ecclesiastical sphere was both " sacrilege " (III,242) and
''spoliation" (III,247); it goaded Newman, still recuperating
from a nearly fatal illness in Sicily, into hastening home: "I
have a work to do in England." H
The spontaneity of his decision was only apparent; his yearning to become involved had been voiced several weeks before
his departure for the Mediterranean: " if times are troublous,
Oxford will want hot headed men, and such I mean to be " (II,
367). Moreover, months before the Oxford Movement began,
people were looking to Newman for leadership; as his future
brother-in-law, Thomas Mozley, had predicted:
... Newman is not a man to be deterred by temporary failures. He
is, indeed, better calculated than any man I know 1 by his
•• Ibid., p. 40.

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

291

his learning, by his patience and perseverance, his conciliatory man-

ners, and the friends he can employ in the cause-of whom I hope
to be one-to release the Church of England from her present oppressed and curtailed condition (II, 199).

In effect, Newman had not only the traits but, with the freedom from tutoring, the time to lead the Tractarian movement;
as he later acknowledged: " Humanly speaking, that movement never would have been, had he not been deprived of his
Tutorship, or had Keble, not Hawkins, been Provost." 25
The Oxford Movement
Further facets of Newman's role in the Oxford Movement
will presumably become evident with the publication of the remaining volumes of his Letters a,nd Di.arks. Yet it is not only
with the discovery of new details of Tractarian history that future investigation should be concerned. Scholars will also have
the opportunity of comparing Newman's assessment of the
Movement, as presented in his Apologia, with the data in his
journals and correspondence. Such material may prove helpful
not only in furnishing information about the movement's motivation and maneuvering but, more importantly, about the development of those insights which were the movement's ideological grounding.
Some of these interpretative issues have been provocatively
raised by John R. Griffin's The Oxford Movement: a Revisicm,26 which challenges a number of conventional views. In
contrast to those interpreters who "have invariably suggested
that the political basis of the Tracts was conservative,"
Griffin contends that " the politics of Keble and his friends were
the very opposite of Tory or conservative." 27 In contrast to
those who have characterized the Oxford Movement as academic and spiritual as well as those who have maintained" that
25 John Henry Newman, Autobiographical Writings, edited by Henry Tristram
(New York: Sheed and Ward, 1957), p. 91!
26 Front Royal, Virginia: Christendom Publications, 1980; the introduction and
chapters of this book appeared as articles in Faith and Reason V/S (Fall, 1979),
V/4 (Winter, 1979), and VI/I (Spring, 1980).
07 Ibid., pp. 1-2.

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JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

the early Tractarians were indifferent to the great social questions," Griffin sees the leaders as " intent on removing the
church from its connections with the upper-classes, and giving
it back to the people, the middle and lower classes." 28 And in
contrast to those who consider the Oxford Movement as basically doctrinally motivated, Griffin claims that " there was in
fact no consensus on doctrines at the start of the Oxford Movement, apart from a belief in Baptismal Regeneration and
Apostolic Succession." 29
Equally revisionist are Griffin's appraisals of the Tractarian
leaders. Keble, first of all, may have been less the herald sounding a return to traditional Anglican doctrines, and more the
progenitor advocating a total separation of church and state.
Although such a proposal was radical (at least to High
Church Anglicans of that day) the political route espoused by
Keble seems more in keeping with his temper: non-resistance to
disestablishment. Revolutionary ideology may, of course, cool
between university campus and countryside-parish; in any
event, by the time when Keble left Oxford for a comfortable
parsonage at Hursley, "he had more or less abandoned all of
the radical notions of N ationa.l Apostasy." 30
More avowedly radical was Richard Hurrell Froude (180836), whose premature death deprived Newman of one of his
closest friends, and the Oxford Movement of one of its most
gifted members. Froude was unsparing in denouncing "the
low spiritual state of the clergy, the evils of the Reformation,
and the Erastianism of the Reformers." 31 Froude' s attack
against the Reformers set him apart from the other Tractarian
leaders: " Newman disliked the Reformation and the reformers,
but did not attack them. Keble did not dislike the re28 Ibid., pp. 2-3; also see J. Griffin, "The Social Implications of the Oxford Movement." Historical Magazine of the Protestant Episcopal Church 44 (1975), 155165.
29 The Oxford Movement: a Revision, p. 4.
30 Ibid., p. 29; also see J. Griffin, "John
Keble: Radical," Anglican Theological
Review 53 (171) 167-173, and "John Keble: a Report from the Devil's Advocate,''
Historical Magazine of the Protestant Episcopal Church 48 (1979) 219-237.
31 The Oxford Movement: a Revision, p. 39.

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

formers." 32 And, the fourth of the Tractarian leaders, Edward
Pusey, even supported the construction of a memorial to the
Protestant bishops who were martyred at Oxford during the
reign of Queen Mary .33
Pusey's view of the Reformation was apparently not his only
difference with the other Tractarians; in contrast to their antierastianism, "Pusey subordinated the church, from first to last,
to the state." 34 Pusey's divergence from the other Tractarian
leaders has caused Griffin to argue that "Pusey really had no
place at all in the original Oxford Movement." 35 If then Pusey
joined a movement which he really didn't understand, was
Newman, in turn, either too polite or too politic to disown the
support of one of Oxford's most distinguished professors?
In any case, Griffin finds that "Newman believed that Catholicism and Erastianism are contradictory terms." 86 Newman
envisioned the Catholic system as " hidden behind the existing
one;" thus, " the Catholic element could triumph only when its
connections with the Establishment were at an end." 37 Although Newman" viewed the prospect of disestablishment and
the loss of status by the clergy as a positive development that
would enhance the spiritual ministry of the clergy," he also
felt that " it was wrong for the clergy to directly involve itself
in politics and to act without the sanction of their ecclesiastical
superiors." 38
If, as Griffin's investigation suggests, the internal tensions
within Tractarianism were more diverse than commentators
have commonly assumed, equal complexity is found in the Oxford Movement's interaction with other parties in the Church
••Ibid., p. 41.
Ibid., pp. 63-66; see D. M. Loades, The Oxford Martyrs (New York: Stein

88

and Day, 1970).

•• The Oxford Movement: a Revision, p. 67.
Ibid., p. 63; cf. p. 94. Also see J. Griffin, "Dr. Pusey and the Oxford Movement," Historical Magazine of the Protestant Episcopal Church 42 (1973), 187-153.
86 The Oxford Movement: a Revision, p. 38.
87 Ibid., pp. 25, 24.
38 Ibid., pp. 27, 35; also see J. Griffin, "The Anglican Politics of Cardinal Newman," Anglican Theological Review 55· (October, 1973), 434-443.
85

294

JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

of England in general, and with the " Evangelical Party " in
particular. Tractarian-Evangelical dynamics, however, tended
to be volatile, because the so-called "Evangelical Party "
tended to he amorphous; as Peter Toon's recent study recognizes, " there is some difficulty in defining who were Evangelicals in this period." 89
In fact, " within Oxford there were only a few Evangelicals
in prominent positions " 40
situation which may have
tributed to Newman's metamorphosis from evangelicalism,
through noeticism, to catholicism. Initially, the Evangelical
response to Tractarianism wavered between cautious approval
and incipient suspicion. On the one hand, the emerging Tractarian position included broad areas of doctrinal agreement, as
well as specific issues (such as the exclusion of dissenters from
the university) which appealed to Anglican Evangelicals. On
the other hand, as the Oxford Movement developed, Evangelicals became increasingly aware of specific points of doctrinal
incompatibility.
The first issue dividing Tractarians and Evangelicals centered on "the rule of faith": "Where is' Divine Revelation to
be found? What is the value of Tradition? What are the limits
and duties of private judgment? " 41 In responding to these
questions, Tractarians appealed to the celebrated canon of Vincent of Lerins-quod
quod semper, quod ab omnibus-understood to mean that " catholic consent in the whole
primitive Church for several centuries in favour of any doctrine
•• Eva71!(Jelical Theology, 1833-1856, A Response to Tractarianism (Atlanta: John
Knox Press, 1979), $18.50, p. 4. Toon proposes the following definition (p. 5):
"An Evangelical Anglican has a strong attachment to the Protestantism of the
national Church with its Articles of Religion and Prayer Book. He believes that
the Bible is authoritative in matters of faith and conduct and is to be read individually and in the home as well as in church. He emphasises the doctrine of
justification by faith but with good works and a specific (holy) life-style as the
proof of true faith. He claims to enjoy a personal relationship with God through
Christ, the origins of which are usually traced not to sacramental grace but to a
conversion experience. And he sees the primary task of the Church in terms of
evangellsm or missions and so emphasises preaching at home and abroad."
••Ibid., p. I.
"Ibid., p. 115.

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

295

or interpretation of Scripture or other matter is a sure proof
that it was derived from the apostles. " 42 The Evangelicals
quickly contended that the Vincentian canon " could not be
used as the Tractarians were using it." 43
Another doctrinal issue separating Evangelicals and Tractarians was "justification;" in particular, Newman's Lectures
on Justification (1838) can be seen as a direct challenge to the
Evangelical understanding of "justification by faith only." 44
For Evangelicals, justification was " merely a question of imputation, 'a change in God's sight';" for Newman, "imputed
righteousness is the coming in of actual righteousness." 45 For
Evangelicals, justification was conferred through a conversionexperience; for Newman, Justification is given "by admission
into the church through the sacrament of Baptism." 46 If Evangelicals were quite correct in considering such difl'erences " irreconcilable," they were wrong in categorizing Newman's position as "Popish Heterodoxy." 47 Newman, in fact, grounded
his theology of justification on the Greek fathers and select
seventeenth-century Anglican divines.
The Evangelicals made a second tactical mistake in presupposing that " the traditional terminology of Reformational
and Post-Reformational debates is valid for nineteenth-century
controversy within the Church of England and is therefore the
correct way to discuss the doctrine of justification." 48 As a re42 IbUl., p. 125; on post-Reformation
interest in Vincent's Commonitorium, see
Owen Chadwick, From Bossuet to Newman: The Idea of Doctrinal Development
(Cambridge: University Press, 1957), pp. 15-16.
••Toon, op. cit., p. 125. Newman too came to recognize the inadequacy of the
Vincentian canon and turned to the idea of " development" as an explanation for
an enduring yet evolving " rule of faith." Unfortunately, Toon does not go into
detail on the Evangelical reaction to Newman's hypothesis of development (cf. p.
115).
"See Thomas Sheridan, Newman on Justification (Staten Island, New York:
Alba House, 1967), p. 247.
••Ibid., pp. 247, 248.
••Ibid., p. 242; incidentally, Newman's own conversion-experience did not follow the Evangelical pattern (cf. C. S. Dessain, "Newman's First Conversion, 'A
Great Change of Thought', August 1st till December 21st 1816," Studies 46 (1957),
44-59/Newman Studien 8 (1957), 87-58.
47 Toon, op. cit., p. 14'),.
•• IbUl., p. 145.

296

JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

suit, " the Evangelicals never really answered the doctrine of
justification proposed by Newman," who, in turn, " never felt
that his Lectures had been seriously challenged." 49
The third area of contention dividing Tractarians and Evan·
gelicals was the mediatorial role of the church. At issue was a
variety of disputed questions on such topics as the relationship
of the invisible Church and the visible churches, the nature and
importance of the episcopacy, the spiritual effects of infant
baptism, the way in which Christ is present in the Eucharist,
etc. Given these differences about the church's ministry and
sacraments (as well as about doctrine in general and justification in particular), it seems anomalous for Toon to contend
that " what is most impressive about the controversy between
the Tractarians and Evangelicals is the great area of agreement which existed between the two parties." 50
In historical perspective, the Evangelicals and Tractarians
seem to have shared a fundamental Christian commitment that
served as the basis for a modicum of cooperation during the
initial stages of the Oxford Movement; however, they soon
parted company over issues which they, at least, considered
significant: " the place of tradition, the authority of the ordained ministry, the nature and efficacy of the sacraments, and
the place of ritual and ceremonial in worship." 51 Although one
can readily concede that controversialists customarily suffer
some kind of myopia, a similar defect may afflict those who
over-look the importance of the controversy: were not the
Tractarians and Evangelicals quite perceptive is recognizing
what issues were theologically important?
If the theological significance of the Oxford Movement can
sti'll be argued, the historical effects of the Evangelical-Tractarian controversy can be seen as detrimental. In Toon's judgment, " the controversy helped to increase and to cement party
feeling within Evangelicalism and probably also within the
Church of England;" in addition, Evangelical theological re•• Ibid., p. 168.
Ibid., p. 208.
"'Ibid.
00

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

fl97

newal was stymied because of the false confidence that "Evangelical theology and the theology of the Reformation were to
all intent and purpose the same." 52 While Toon credits Evangelicals for reminding" the whole Church that the Tractarians
were essentially innovators and that their historical claims were
all too often ill-founded," he admits that "nothing positive appears to have been added to Evangelical thought or practice
by this controversy." 58
If the Evangelicals apparently gained little from the Oxford
Movement, Newman, in contrast, seems to have always bene:fitted from his Evangelical background:
... once the first difficult years of his conversion were over, Newman
more and more rediscovered his own past. His conversion is to be
understood in terms of development, a development in which he
took with him into the Roman Catholic Church all the good that he
had learnt in his Anglican years. 54

Faith versus Doubt
One instance of such a carry-over from his Anglican years
can be found in Newman's convictions about the relationship
between reason and faith- convictions that received a systematic presentation in An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent (1870) , only after "more attempts at writing it" than he
could remember. 55
Newman's concern about the faith-reason dialectic antedated the Oxford Movement; for example, Newman's reservations about the utility of logical argumentation in arriving at
convictions and, correspondingly, his emphasis on the role of
conscience and (what he later called) the "illative sense" in
attaining religious truth seem foreshadowed in a letter which he
wrote in 1830 to Simeon Lloyd Pope, an alumnus (as was Newman) of Trinity College, Oxford:
52 Ibid., p. 204; similarly, " this controversy
an unhealthy antagonism
towards innovations in ceremonial, ritual, and architecture " (p. 205) .
53 Ibid., p. 206.
"'A. M. Allchin, "The Via Media-an Anglican Revaluation," in Newman: a
Portrait Restored, p. 79.
55 John Henry Newman, Autobiographical Writings, p. 269.

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JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

Practical matters cannot be defended by argument, or explained
on paper- (i.e. except accidentally)-they are determined by the
of the agent-who (whether he be correct or not) still adopts
his measures, not on a process of reasoning which words will do
justice to, but on feeling, on the dictates of an internal unproduceable sense (II, 264).

A similar view about the acquisition of moral truth is evident in a pensive letter to his mother in 1829: "Moral truth
is gained by patient study, by calm reflection, silently as the
dew falls, unless miraculously given, and, when gained, it is
transmitted by faith and by' prejudice' (II, UH) .56 Not only
did Newman realize that the acquisition of religious truth is a
process more discretionary than logical reasoning, he also recognized that such discernment is subject to corruption: " As each
individual has certain instincts of right and wrong, antecedently to reasoning, on which he acts and rightly so, which perverse
reasoning may supplant, which then can hardly be regained,
but, if regained, will :be regained from a different source, from
reasoning, not from nature, so, I think, has the world of men
collectively " (II, 1.80) .
These recurring issues - the relation of reasoning and believing, the moral dispositions necessary for religious belief, the
role of the illative sense in arriving at faith - are given a transparent solution in the Grammar of Assent. Unfortunately, for
many readers, '.'the Grammar is a baffiing book at first
sight;" 57 even philosophers and theologians have found it to be
"one of the most obscure books that has ever been written." 58
The problems that readers experience in understanding Newman's Grammar are operative at several levels. The initial deterrent is one of terminology; yet it is really not so much a
•• It should be noted that "prejudice " for Newman tended to have a less pejorative meaning (e.g., similar to "prejudgment")
than it usually has in current
American usage.
57 C. Dessain. "Cardinal
Newman on the Theory and Practice of Knowledge:
The Purpose of the Grammar of Assent," Downside Review 75 (1957) I; this
article (which is substantially reprodurn:!d in Dessain's John Henry Newman, pp.
148-159) is a helpful introduction to the Grammar.
58 F. Bacchus, "How to Read the 'Grammar of Assent',"
The Month, CXLilI
106.

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

!l99

case of Newman's terms being unusual, as it is that his usage
is different from what many would expect. Specifically, his
meanings tend to be closer to their eighteenth-century British
denotations, which are frequently only secondary or tertiary
in contemporary American parlance.
Further difficulties can arise through failing to understand
Newman's purpose in writing the Grammar. As he once remarked to a fellow Oratorian:
Object of the book twofold. In the first part shows that you can
believe what you cannot understand. In the second part that you
can believe what you cannot absolutely prove.59
As such a summary suggests, Newman's concern was a" grammatical" schematization of the way that people actually believe; thus, his treatment of the way that faith operates in
everyday life is the equivalent of a " language paradigm " for
the functioning of faith in response to revelation. In other
words, Newman's aim was less the systematic analysis of the
genesis of faith, less the construction of a philosophical/theological categorization of the relationship of reason and faith
(though elements of such analysis and categorization are undoubtedly present in the Grammar) and more a matter of
" taking a view " about the functional interaction of reasoning
and believing in the concrete circumstances of life.
" For Newman, the term ' view ' refers to that synthetic,
personal grasp of concrete reality which was his educational
and intellectual ideal." 60 In contrast is an "objective " approach to reality-an approach that was not only the hallmark
of scientific investigation, but was also characteristic of most
Roman Catholic theology at the time that Newman wrote the
Grammar. By way of comparison, if logical consistency and
systematic completeness are deemed essential in a ' scientific'
approach to faith, a ' view ' legitimizes . practical decisions
" even though particular details and difficulties remain unex69 C. Dessain, John Henry Newman, p. 148.
••Nicholas Lash, Newman on Development: The Search for an Explanation in
History (Shepherdstown, West Virginia: Patmos Press, 1975), p. 85.

800

JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

amined and unaccounted for." 61 In other words, though a
" view " must be thematically coherent, it need not be theoretically complete; after all, the best of grammars must allow
for linguistic irregularities. Accordingly, if the Grammar is
really "taking a view" of faith (rather than constructing a
systematic theological treatise), then it should not be surprising to detect a number of incongruities, or even inconsistencies
in Newman's schematization of faith.
A number of the Grammar's problematic aspects are highlighted in M. Jamie Ferreira's recent investigation of" the role
of the will in Newman's thought." 62 For Newman, faith is an
unconditional assent; thus, in marked opposition to those who
would picture faith as a doubt-defying leap into the darkness
of the unknown, Newman insisted that faith and doubt cannot
co-exist. Newman's stance contains the implicit question: "is
the claim that doubt is incompatible with faith only understandable in terms of wilful suppression of doubt and the obverse ' will to be certain ' ? " 68
Newman's insistence on the unconditionality of faith was a
deliberate reaction against those who maintained that assent
has various degrees depending on the amount of evidence available and that, as a consequence, only " practical " certitude is
possible in religious matters. If anything, Newman felt that
such opinions fail by their excess of logic; they treat certainty
as if it springs from an abstract, automatic, analytic paradigm.
Newman, however, believed that no logical procedure can ever
relieve a believer of personal responsibility and so rejected
" any explanation of our certainty which implies that our experience, our natural reasoning processes, as they are, cannot
give us the certainty we desire and experience." 64
In formulating this position, Newman steered a judicious
course between the pitfalls of, respectively, a scepticism which
61
62

Ibid., p. 36.
Doubt and Religious Commitment: The Role of the Will in Newman's Thought

(Oxford: Clarendon Press/New York: Oxford University Press, 1980), $28.50.
•• Ibid., p. 12.
••Ibid., p. 25.

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

801

caricatured faith as the carrying-over of childish convictions,
an evidentialism which harnessed faith to an accumulation of
apologetic arguments, and a voluntarism which reduced faith
to a species of sentimentalism. Consequently, for Newman,
faith has to include a reasonable assent for which the believer
is responsible, an empirical process of personal observation and
evaluation, and a free decision willed by (and so never forced
on) the believer.
In taking account of his adversaries, Newman both responded to, and borrowed from, his opponents. For example,
his understanding and use of agnostic arguments (though for
the purpose of refutation) was so accurate that Thomas Huxley remarked that he could " compile a Primer of ' Infidelity ' "
from some of Newman's works. 6 " In another vein, a number of
his contemporary critics accused him of a fideism that rendered
belief immune to criticism by fiat: "Newman's Grammar was
made the particular target of the widespread charge that
Roman Catholicism's prescriptions enslaved the intellects of
its followers." 66
Equally presumptuous was his critics' claim that Newman
viewed faith as" a dogmatic refusal never to change our assent
or a dogmatic adherence to our initial assent no matter what." 67
Although such an impression can be extrapolated from some of
the Grammar's statements (when taken in isolation) his insistence on the indubitability of assent is adroitly balanced by
his allowing the reversibility of assent. On the one hand, in a
stance that was simultaneously anti-Cartesian and anti-Hermesian, Newman prescriptively rejected both universal doubt
and "the dropping of assent in order to see where the truth
lies." 68 On the other hand, Newman recognized that "just as
arguments embolden and protect our assents, by the same
token they can finally tell against them." 69 In other words, if
••Charles F. Harrold, John Henry Newman (London/New York/Toronto: Longmans, Green, 1945; Harnden, Connecticut: Archon, 1966), p. 123.
•• M. Ferreira, op. cit., p. 77.
••Ibid., p. 87.
68 Ibid., p. 91.
•• Ibid., p. 84.

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JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

assent precludes " the admission that it is ' reasonable ' to
doubt in this particular case," his "prohibition on doubt is not
meant to and does not entail ultimate immunity from
criticism." 70
In contrast then to Newman's apparent insistence on the indubitability of assent and the correlative indefectibility of certitude, Ferreira has detected "an important strand in Newman's work- as yet inadequately appreciated- according
to which certitude and religious commitment are not uncriticizable." 71 Ferreira finds that Newman's exclusion of doubt is
nqt absolute: "for Newman, as for Wittgenstein, to be certain
was to be able to exclude, not all doubt, but all 'reasonable'
doubt." 72 In effect, Newman could consistently claim "both
that we reject the insinuation that ' there is the faintest chance
of our being mistaken ' and that we can recognize that there is
a 'mathematical chance' of error, and even more, that there
can be reasoned arguments against our certitude." 78
To the firm believer, such a chance seems remote and such
arguments improbable; " but it is nevertheless possible that in
a given situation we could recognize something as sufficient
warrant for changing our commitment." 74 Although Newman
hypothesized "that a man might travel in his religious profession all the way from heathenism to Catholicity, through
Mahometanism, Judaism, Unitarianism, Protestantism, and
Anglicanism without any one certitude lost, but with a continual accumulation of truths," Ferreira counters that Newman
" has not shown that a conversion does not involve a loss of at
least one certitude, nor that a genuine certitude is never lost." 75
Obviously, though Newman later liked to maintain that his
Anglican convictions were the foundation for his Roman Catholic beliefs,76 not all of his Anglican certitudes could be transIbid., pp. 96-7, 99.
Ibid., p. 108.
72 Ibid., p. 109.
1 • Ibid., p. no.
74 Ibid., p. 126.
75 Ibid., p. 104, 105.
76 In a letter to E. E. Estcourt on June ft, 1860, Newman pointedly remarked
about the converts from the Oxford Movement: " Catholics did not make us
70

11

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

308

ferred to his Roman Catholic life. However, should one then
conclude that real certitudes can be lost through conversion?
Or, as an alternative, does the conversion-experience basically
enable the convert to distinguish between real and apparent
certitudes? Yet, even if conversion gives the convert a basis
for discernment, "there is no infallible test for discriminating
knowledge from putative knowledge." 77
Infallible discernment aside, " religious commitment for
Newman involves persistence in two ways": in the initial
process of reaching certitude, believers experience " a spontaneous resistance to change in belief - a resistance which is
an inevitable concomitant of the proess of reaching certitude;"
secondly, in the reflections confirming such certitude, emerges
" a deliberate commitment, which can find expression in a
variety of forms of resistance to change." 78 Underlying these
different types of persistence are two different roles of the will:
first, in reaching certitude, the will's role is one of " active recognition," which is Newman's way of avoiding both "a direct
willing to believe " as well as " an automatic, involuntary reflex action in the face of 'objective' facts;" 79 secondly, knowing that a believer's certitude can be stifled by the introduction
of doubts, Newman envisioned as the second role of the will
(after the initial experience of certitude) " a deliberate act of
intending to adhere, in contrast to the non-deliberate or nonintentional adherence that is part of certitude itself." 80
Nonetheless, though the will has a doubly important role in
Newman's view of religious assent, his position should not be
Catholics; Oxford made us Catholics" (Letters and Diaries of John Henry Newman XIX, 352) .
77 Ferreira, Doubt and Rdigious Commitment, p. 128; in her article on "Newman: Rationality, Doubt and Unconditional Commitment," Nineteenth Century
Theology Working Group VI (Berkeley: Graduate Theological Union, 1980), p. 32,
Ferreira re-emphasized "Newman's recognition that
is not necessary
for certainty. This is not a trivial recognition on Newman's part since a century
later it is still thought necessary to remind philosophers that certitude does not
require infallibility."
78 Ferreira, Doubt and Religious Commitment, p. 129.
79 Ibid., pp. 71-73.
so Ibid., p. 75.

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JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

reduced to an acritical voluntarism. First of all, "his understanding of the character of our concrete attainment of certitudes precludes the necessity of bridging a gap between inf erence and certitude in any way distinct from the actual process
of reasoning itself." 81 Secondly, though Newman at times
speaks of religious assent as " an act of will," such terminology
is, in Ferreira's judgment, a way of highlighting either "the
quality of personal appropriation involved in reaching certitude
in concrete cases" or "the deliberate affirmation of the certitude we in fact experience in such cases." 82 The role of the
will in Newman's thought then should not be understood either
as " a decision to become certain " or " a decision which effects
or completes certainty;" thus, "his distinction between judging
that we ought to be certain and being certain was therefore a
distinction between experiencing certitude and affirming it,
rather than a distinction between seeing we ought to be certain
and deciding to become certain." 83
Newman's depiction of the will's role in ordinary matters of
assent and certitude leads to the question of a parallel role of
the will in the path toward, and the profession of, divine faith.
There is no doubt that Newman's carefully constructed" grammar " projects a parallelism between natural assent and divine
faith: "Newman's whole method in the Grammar indicates
that he saw an understanding of religious belief as dependent
on an understanding of belief and certitude in general." 84
Granted this correspondence, one still needs to ask whether
Newman's" grammatical parallelism" is applicable to the special language of divine faith; thus, in more traditional terms,
the critical question is how precisely divine faith differs from
human faith. 85
Once this question is raised, the reader has reached the limit
(or at least the end) of Ferreira's investigation-thoµgh with
Ibid., p. 130.
Ibid.
••Ibid.
8 ' Ibid., p. 141.
86 Ibid., p. 133.
81

89

RECENT NEWMAN STUDIES

305

several issues that need to be probed further. For example, if
it would appear that " since the material object is the same,
divine and human faith are materially obverses of each other;
the same material object is looked at from different perspectives " 86 - however, if the material object involves a divine
mystery, is the difference between the object (s) of divine and
human faith only one of perspective? Again, while one may
concede that " faith could be a decision to affirm the certainty
we experience, but a decision informed by grace, and resulting
in a consummate certainty qualitatively distinct from the earlier one " 87 - one would like to know more about this " qualitative " distinction and the specific way it enables divine faith
to transcend human. Similarly, if it is "likely that Newman
saw the act of divine faith as coextensive not merely with the
active confirmation of religious belief, but with the role of the
will within the reasoning process itself in coming to certitude " 88 - it still must be ascertained whether this parallelism
is not only (horizontally) coextensive, but (vertically)
transcendent.
Although Ferreira's book leaves these and other questions
unanswered, on the whole her work is an important contribution to Newman-studies. In a critical, yet appropriately circumspect way, Ferreira has pursued an important thematic
problem in Newman's understanding of belief. The presentation is concise, even staccato; thus, every sentence must be
carefully considered; similarly, the style, though clear, is crisp,
so that readers unfamiliar with Newman's terminology may feel
the need for greater explanation. And, recalling the philosophical procrusteanization to which Newman's thought has been
subjected in the past, one may be a bit apprehensive in picking up a study that purports to bring Newman's thought into
dialogue with contemporary philosophy. Such apprehensions
are short-lived; this book is remarkably successful in schematizing the options available to, and the choices explicitly or imIbid., p. 185.
Ibid., p. 186.
88 Ibid., p. 187.
86
87

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JOHN T. FORD, C.S.C.

plicitly made by, Newman in working out his view of religious
commitment in the Grammar of Assent.
Postscript
As these recent resource- and research-works clearly indicate,
scholarly interest in Newman and the Oxford Movement shows
no sign of waning. Yet this interest in Newman is not simply
a matter of anglophile-nostalgia nor antiquarian romanticism;
rather this interest represents a rediscovery of a wisdom that is
perennial. Were one then to ask: " What is the special value of
Cardinal Newman today?" 89 -it would be appropriate to
ponder the reply of the late archivist of the Birmingham Oratory, Charles Stephen Dessain, whose " encyclopaedic learning
provided the foundation on which the present school of Newman studies now rests: " 90
In Newman we have a man who in his youth came, by God's
grace, to accept the Christian faith wholeheartedly, but incomand was then led on, in
pletely, .even in some matters
unique and providential circumstances, to recover it in a surprisingly balanced, full and pure form. We too wish to hold our faith
in as balanced, full and pure a form as possible, both for our own
sakes, and so that others may be drawn to it and it may be effective.91
JoHN T. FoRD, C.S.C.
The Catholic University of America
Washington, D.C.

C. S. Dessain, Newman's Spiritual Themes (Dublin: Veritas, 1977), p. 9.
J. Coulson, "Father Stephen Dessain-An Appreciation," Spode House Review, Occasional Papers: Cardinal Newman 3 (1976), 3.
91 C. S. Dessain, Newman's Spiritual Themes, p. 9; an almost identical remark
was made by Dessain in his presentation on "Newman as an Anglican and a
Catholic," Spode House Review, Occasional Papers 3 (1976), 17.
89

90

ST. THOMAS AND THE MORAL AGENT

T:

HE PERSON who is a fit subject for moral praise or
moral blame is, for the purposes of this paper, the
moral agent, and being morally praiseworthy or morally blameworthy, again for the purposes of this paper, constitutes the moral worth of the moral agent. For many, the free
performance of an action and knowledge of that action's moral
quality are both necessary and together suffice for a person's
having the status of a moral agent. For them, the person who
freely performs an action the moral quality of which the person knows is the prime example of the moral agent. Such a
person may freely perform an action, say z, knowing it to be
wrong (morally forbidden) 1, and such a person may freely perform an action, say x, knowing it to be right (morally required) .2 In the first case, the moral agent is blameworthy, and
in the second case, the moral agent is praiseworthy. With respect to this account and example of the moral agent, what
is in truth the moral quality of the action of the person who
knows its moral quality seems both necessary and sufficient
for the moral worth of the moral agent. 3
Many other people hold, however, that persons who do not
know the moral quality of their actions are moral agents. St.
Thomas Aquinas, for example, taught that a person who performs an action, y, thinking it to be wrong, is a moral agent
1

2

In what follows, I shall always mean morally forbidden by "wrong."
In what follows, I shall always mean morally required by " right."

3 If the action of the person who knows its moral quality be right, the person
who performs it knowing it to be right is a praiseworthy moral agent, and if the
person who knows the moral quality of his or her action be a praiseworthy moral
agent, his or her action is right; moreover, if the action of the person who knows
its moral quality be wrong, the person who performs it knowing it to be wrong is
a blameworthy moral agent, and if the person who knows the moral quality of his
or her action be a blameworthy moral agent, his or her action is wrong.

307

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MATTHEW J. KELLY

and is blameworthy,4 and others, influenced by his views, thmk
he should also have taught that a person who thinks about the
moral quality of the action he or she freely performs is a moral
agent, and if no moral fault can be found with that moral agent
for thinking as he or she does, then that moral agent is praiseworthy if the moral agent does y thinking it to be right. 5 This
emendation of Aquinas's views, which is the modern position of
those who suppose that non-culpable conscience obligates, suggests that free performance of an action and thinking about its
moral quality are both necessary and together suffice for a person who performs that action having the status of a moral
agent.
Leaving aside for now the question of who is right about the
conditions which account for a person being a moral agent, the
upholders of the claims of non-culpable conscience seem committed to the view that the moral agent is praiseworthy or
blameworthy independently of what is in truth the moral quality of the action of the moral agent. 8 Indeed, for the upholders
of conscience, what is necessary and sufficient for the moral
worth of the moral agent seems to be some relationship between what a moral agent non-culpably thinks about the moral
quality of his or her action and the action itself, which relationship is independent of the real moral quality of the action. 7
• Quodl. III, rn, 2:
" Si ergo aliquid quod secundum se non est contra legem Dei, ut levare festucam de terra, vel iurare, apprehendatur, errante conscientia, ut contra legem
Dei existens, et sic voluntas in ipsum feratur, manifestum est quod voluntas
fertur, per se loquendo, et formaliter, in id quod est contra legem Dei; materialiter autem in id quod non est contra legem Dei; immo forte in id quod
est secundum Jegem Dei. Et ideo manifestum est quod est ibi contemptus
legis Dei; et ideo necesse est quod sit ibi peccatum."
Cf. I-II, 19, 5.
•Eric D'Arcy, Conscience and its Right to Freedom (New York, Sheed and
Ward: 1961), pp. 113-141, and especially p. 114 where he tells us Aquinas ought
to have taught that " Any action which follows conscience is praiseworthy and
good."
6 The moral quality of the action of the moral agent who thinks about his or her
action can be wrong and not right if the moral agent is praiseworthy and right
and not wrong if the moral agent is blameworthy.
7 While this relationship is somewhat difficult to describe, it appears to be some
relationship of consistency between thought and action such that if the action we

ST. THOMAS AND THE MORAL AGENT

309

But the point we have reached is surely unacceptable. What
suffices and is necessary for the moral worth of the moral agent
cannot both be and not be what is in truth the moral quality
of the moral agent's action, nor can it be and not be some relationship between thought and action which is independent of
the moral quality of the action.
Now the upholders of the claims of non-culpable conscience
will deny that their views lead to any such unacceptable conclusion. Some of them will argue that they accept the view
that the moral worth of the moral agent depends upon the
moral quality of his or her action, their point being that the
moral quality of a person's action is determined by what he or
she non-culpably thinks about the moral quality of the action
in question. In other words, if person, A, thinks action x is
wrong, then x is wrong and in performing x, A is a blameworthy moral agent, and, similarly, should A think x is right,
then x is right and in performing x, A is a praiseworthy moral
agent. 8 But this view that one cannot non-culpably think in·
correctly about the moral quality of one's action avoids our
unacceptable conclusion at too high a price, for it suggests that
when it comes to the moral quality of one's action there is no
such thing as knowledge and correct or incorrect thinking;
there is only a thinking which, if it is free from moral fault, assigns or legislates the moral quality of one's action.
Other upholders of the claims of conscience, who do not suppose it legislates but that it is either knowledge of, or correct
or incorrect thinking about, the moral quality of one's action,
will argue that when it comes to the moral evaluation of moral
perform be the one we think to be right then we are morally praiseworthy and if
this consistency is not there and the action we perform be the one we think to be
wrong then we are morally blameworthy. Aquinas talks about this relationship in
terms of agreement or lack of agreement between will and reason; see I-II, 19, 5
and 6.
8 Vermeersch, Theologi,ae Moralis Principia, Rome, 1923, vol. I, p. 293: "Hence
whether in theory conscience be correct or mistaken, an action will have in fact
whatever evil or goodness conscience attributes to it." Quoted with approval and
translated by D'Arcy, op. cit. p. 114. D'Arcy there claims that this view "is
typical of Catholic opinion today."

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MATTHEW J, KELLY

agents (whether we are dealing with agents who know or think
incorrectly about the moral quality of their actions) the real
moral quality of their actions is irrelevant to their moral worth
and what determines their moral worth is a relationship of consistency between the thought (whether incorrect thinking or
knowledge) of the moral agent about the moral quality of his
or her action and the action itself, which relationship is independent of the real moral quality of the action.v As they see it,
then, our unacceptable conclusion can be avoided, for when it
is a question of the moral evaluation of agents, the person who
knows the moral quality of the action he or she performs is
reducible without remainder to the person who thinks (correctly or incorrectly) about the moral quality of his or her
action, and the very same relationship which suffices for the
moral worth of the latter suffices and is necessary for the moral
worth of the former.
But for this view to succeed, it must be plausible to suppose that the relationship between the thought and action of
the person who knows the moral quality of his or her action is
identical to the relationship which holds between the thought
and action of the person who thinks about but does not know
the moral quality of his or her action. This relationship, however, cannot be the same since in the case of the person who
knows the moral quality of his or her action the relationship
entails something about the moral quality of the action and
in the case of the person who only thinks about the moral quality of his or her action nothing is entailed about the action's
moral quality. 10 Moreover, it must also be plausible to suppose
that when it comes to the moral worth of the moral agent
knowledge of the moral quality of one's action functions in the
same way as incorrect thinking about the moral quality of
one's action. In other words, whether one knows the moral
quality of one's action or thinks incorrectly about it makes no
difference to one's moral worth.
Aquinas's views on conscience suggest a different way of
•See above note 7.
See above notes 3 and 6.

10

ST. THOMAS AND THE MORAL AGENT

811

avoiding the unacceptable conclusion about what suffices and is
necessary for the moral worth of the moral agent, but only if
we develop his views in a way diametrically opposed to both
what the upholders of conscience think he should have taught
and what he did in fact teach. Aquinas, it will be remembered,
taught that a person who performs a right action thinking it
wrong is a blameworthy moral agent, but he was unwilling to
teach, as the upholders of conscience think he should have, that
a person who performs a wrong action thinking it right is a
praiseworthy moral agent. He was unwilling to teach the latter
because, as he saw it, the action of the person who does wrong
thinking it right is involuntary. 11 Granted the action is involuntary, however, the person who performs it is not a moral
agent, is excusable, and, of course, since the person is not a
moral agent, the person is not blameworthy. Unlike some of
his followers, therefore, since Aquinas thought that such a person is not a moral agent at all, he was unwilling to teach that
such a person is praiseworthy if the person is not blameworthy.
But why not carry out this line of reasoning and conclude
what Aquinas was unwilling to conclude, namely, that the person who performs a right action thinking it to be wrong is not
a moral agent? After all, such persons are as ignorant of the
moral quality of their actions as the former class of persons,
and such persons, because of their ignorance, are not to be
praised for their right actions. Why not say, then, as in the
previous case, that the actions of such persons are involuntary?
But if the action of the person who does the right thing think·
ing it wrong is involuntary, such a person cannot be thought of
as a moral agent, and if such a person is not a moral agent, such
a person is, of course, not praiseworthy, but then, pace
Aquinas, neither is such a person blameworthy.
11 1-11, 19, 6: Although Aquinas usually says such an action is involuntary because of a lack of knowledge of some circumstantial fact or facts, I agree with
D'Arcy, op. cit. p. 118, that St. Thomas would acquiesce in the view that nonculpable, mistaken judgments that actions are right when really wrong should be
handled in the same way, that is, he would agree that ignorance of the wrongness
of an action (even though thought right) renders that action involuntary from a
moral point of view.

312

MATTHEW J. KELLY

If we develop Aquinas's views in this way, we avoid the unacceptable conclusion about what suffices and is necessary for
the moral worth of the moral agent. We do so, however, at the
cost of concluding that the person who thinks about the moral
quality of his or her action (but does not know it) is not a
moral agent.
To say such a person is not a moral agent, however, is not
to say that such a person does not act freely. It may very well
be the case that the sphere of free action is coextensive with
the sphere 0£ knowledgeable action. This would mean, however,
that should a person know everything about his or her action
save its moral quality he or she would be able to perform it
freely but could not be a moral agent. To be a moral agent,
on this view, a person not only needs to know his or her action
and perform it freely, a person needs to know its moral quality
and perform it freely. 12 Contrary to D'Arcy and others, Aquinas's views on conscience and moral agenthood should be developed along the lines that knowledge of moral quality of action and free performance 0£ it are necessary and together suffice for a person being a moral agent. For to develop Aquinas's
views in such a way as to suggest he teaches that mere thinking about the moral quality of one's action and free performance of it are necessary and together suffice for a person being
a moral agent commits the Saint to the view either that the
real moral quality of one's action is irrelevant in the final
analysis to one's moral worth or to the equally pernicious view
that the real moral quality of one's action is causally determined by what one conscientiously thinks about its moral quality, a view acceptable perhaps to a twentieth century moral
thinker but hardly to one from the thirteenth century.
MATTHEW

J. KELLY

Southern Illinois University
Carbondale, Illinois
12 This, I take it, is the force of Aquinas's remark that knowledge of the law is
required if a person is to be bound by it. See De Ver. 17, 3: "Unde nullus ligatur
per praeceptum aliquod nisi mediante scientia illius praecepti. Et ideo ille qui non
est capax notitae, praecepto non Iigatur; nee aliquis ignorans praeceptum Dei,
ligatur ad praecepturn faciendum, nisi quatenus tenetur scire praeceptum. Si autem
non teneatur scire, nee sciat, nullo modo ex praecepto ligatur." (Italics mine.)

BOOK REVIEWS
After Virtue. By ALASDAIR 1\1AclNTYRE.
Pp. vii + 252. $15.95.

University of Notre Dame Press.

After Virtue tells a story. It is the story of the corrosive dismantling of
an Aristotelian ethics of virtue, begun in the Enlightenment, carried on by
G. E. Moore in Principia Ethica, continued by analytic philosophers, enshrined in emotivism, and recognized only by Nietzsche. The setting for the
story is the ravaged world of contemporary morality, a landscape marred
by " a disquieting private arbitrariness," " the conceptual incommensurability of rival arguments," interminable moral debates, and anarchic subjectivism. The mood of the story is bleak. Modern-day ethicists flounder in
confusion because all we possess " are the fragments of a conceptual scheme,
parts which now lack those contexts from which their significance derived"
(p. 2). Worst of all, what makes a resolution so unlikely is that "we are
in a condition which almost nobody recognizes and which perhaps nobody
at all can recognize fully " (p. 4) .
To the storyteller belongs the plot. The task of the storyteller is to take
us through his story, to point us to the beginning but also to show us the
end. The genius of Alasdair Macintyre, the storyteller, is that in his After
Virtue we are the story. After Virtue is a story about ourselves, a story
Macintyre tells to alert us to the nature of our own moral world. The challenge to Alasdair Macintyre, the storyteller, is not only to alert us but to
prepare us to end the story of After Virtue by providing an alternative to
the "barbarism and darkness" already upon us. That alternative is Aristotelianism, an Aristotelianism refurbished in a narrative tradition. MacIntyre ends his story by returning to its beginning; that is, After Virtue
doesn't really end at all. It begins again. It is a story to be re-told, but
if that retelling is not madness, if it is not to be crushing and wearisome,
then its denouement cannot be tragic. Does After Virtue offer an alternative
to tragedy? An attempt to answer this question will focus on five points
crucial to Macintyre's story: his account of what makes modern morality
modern; the significance of Aristotle as the key figure in his story; the importance of narrative in properly understanding the moral life; what MacIntyre means by practice; and, finally, the need for a specific narrative to
characterize a concrete account of the virtues.
Macintyre begins his book with an arresting analogy. He asks us to
imagine a time when natural science has been destroyed because the public
blames it for a series of catastrophes. Later there is a reaction against this
destruction and an attempt is made to revive science. But, since there are

313

314

BOOK REVIEWS

no longer any coherent accounts of the various forms of science existing, all
that can be recovered are bits and pieces of theories and experiments, instruments whose use has been forgotten, and so on. But these fragments are
enough for some to think they have reconstituted physics, biology, etc.
Arguments develop concerning the relative merits of various theories of the
past although the contestants possess only a partial knowlelge of each.
Even more disturbing, because they lack any idea of the beliefs and history
that inform these theories, they have no way to know how the relative
merits of these theories might be tested. As a result rival theories are put
forward with no means of assessing which is the most plausible. Soon philosophers of " science " develop subjectivist theories of the status of scientific claims.
Macintyre contends that the moral world we currently inhabit corresponds almost exactly to this imaginary world of science. We find ourselves
amid " fragments " of past moral systems with no means to assess their
relative merits. As a result emotivism, though a mistaken account of the
meaning and use of moral language, is the most nearly truthful account of
our modern condition. The emotivist is right that we possess no means to
settle claims between incommensurable positions; for we lack the common
presuppositions about our nature that such agreements require.
Moreover Macintyre argues that the Enlightenment project to provide an
independent rational justification of morality has necessarily failed. There
was an ineradicable discrepancy between what thinkers such as Kant,
Hume, and Diderot assumed were the basic moral rules and precepts on the
one hand and their conception of human nature on the other. For example,
no account of the intelligibility of such rules or their justification can be
given if we lack (as they did) any confidence that reason can discover our
true end. But the power of that project continues to dominate modern
philosophical ethics because it seems to be the only alternative to a destructive subjectivism. Consequently our understanding of morality is distorted
because attempts to establish the autonomy of morality mistakenly abstract
ethics from the social and historical conditions necessary for its intelligibility. Thus, in the Enlightenment project, rules and principles become primary to morals, virtues and character secondary.
Yet, if the Enlightenment project dominates our moral theory, subjectivism both institutionally and personally dominates our lives. Lacking any
common moral and political life, we live in a Weberian world where it is no
longer possible to distinguish between power and authority. In such a world,
bureaucracy becomes our only means of maintaining public peace and cooperation; as a result, our main public office becomes that of the manager.
"Personal" life is that which does not come under the focus of bureaucracy;
thus the " personal " is relegated to the arbitrary and subjective. So enters
the other main " character " of the modern world-i.e., the therapist, whose
status, along with that of the manager, demonstrates that all social rela-

BOOK REVIEWS

315

tions in a subjectivist world are necessarily manipulative. In such a world
the self becomes increasingly fragmented because we fear to identify with a
role or a project. We assume that such an identification will destroy our
autonomy. We thus become Goffmanesque role-players alienated even from
our own action. We, thus, lack a "self" sufficient to be formed virtuously.
It is not surprising that in such a world we see the rise of social science
with its mistaken assumption that " fact " and " value " can be separated.
Such a " science " attempts to account for human behavior by eliminating
any reference to intentions since that is what is needed to sustain the
ideology of modern bureaucracy that all politics can be reduced to planning
by" experts." For Macintyre, the expert becomes the symbol of our moral
world as he or she, buttressed by the social sciences, attempts to manipulate
our behavior to secure relative peace. It should not be thought they are
amoral in doing so; indeed, the "experts " will often draw on utilitarian or
Rawlsian conceptions of justice to try to shape their public policies.
Yet the fatal flaw in this new morality is that it simply cannot deliver on
its stated :objective. Macintyre has no wish to deny a level of predictability
to human behavior, but the character of generalization in the social sciences
is decisively qualified by human agency, continuing possibility of conceptual
innovation, and the sheer contingency of human existence. Fortuna is uneliminable and thus our attempt to establish a politics devoid of any shared
sense of the common good is finally hopelessly utopian. The experts' project
fails because the very character of our existence requires judgments about
matters that " can be otherwise."
Macintyre's depiction of our modern situation will no doubt seem to
many highly questionable. Moral philosophers will, we suspect, be particularly critical of his contention that the Enlightenment project has failed.
Certainly Macintyre's arguments against Kantian formalism, his claim
against Gewirth that rights language is conceptually unintelligible, will not
persuade those committed to founding morality on rationality qua rationality. And, as Macintyre himself realizes, he owes us a fuller account of his
alternative sense of rationality, and, in particular, moral rationality. Yet
Macintyre's case against the Enlightenment project does not rest on one
or any set of arguments, but rather is to be tested by the accuracy of his
rendition of our muddled situation .
. It is by no means easy to see how such an assessment can be carried out.
Macintyre wants to rest his case on the historical claim that we are now
living morally in a decisively different manner, but it is not clear from his
book exactly when or what occasioned such a change. Unlike his imaginary
world, he recognizes that, even though our history lies open to view, we
possess no record of any catastrophe that created our fragmentary moral
world. Thus by its very nature his claim rests on providing a plausible interpretation of a long process that is as complex as the confusing world that
seems to have been its fruit. Those, therefore, who will accuse Maclntyre's

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account of being ahistorical fail to appreciate the subtlety of his case. MacIntyre is not suggesting there ever existed a completely morally coherent
age against which our time unfavorably compares. He explicitly denies the
myth that the Middle Ages was a monolithic culture in which Christian
and Greek sources were put in easy harmony. No; medieval culture" was
a fragile and complex balance of a variety of disparate and conflicting elements " (155) .
What makes our age modern is not the loss of harmony, but our inability
to appreciate the significance of the virtues as central for the moral life.
Thus the accuracy of Macintyre's account of our modern moral situation
depends on his attempt to provide, as he attempts to do in the second half
of the book, a defensible presentation of Aristotle's ethics. For though Maclntyre's position involves historical claims, his case rests on the philosophical
claim that " in spite of the efforts of three centuries of moral philosophy
and one of sociology, we lack any coherent rationally defensible statement
of a liberal individualist point of view; and that, on the other hand, the
Aristotelian tradition can be restated in a way that restores intelligibility
and rationality to our moral and social attitudes and commitments"
The heart of Macintyre's book, therefore, is an attempt to provide a
constructive, but critical, account of Aristotle's theory of the virtues. According to Macintyre, part of Aristotle's strength, in contrast to the Enlightenment project and its subsequent imitators, lies in Aristotle's insistence
that there is a moral order that claims us as agents before we consciously
advert to it. Contrary to emotivism, morality isn't something we choose;
rather, it is something because of the very nature of our life in-the-world in
which we are indefatigably involved. The moral life begins foremost not
in a choice but in a discovery, the discovery that "human beings, like the
members of all other species, have a specific nature; and that nature is such
that they have certain aims and goals, such that they move by nature
towards a specific telos" (p. 139). Macintyre recognizes the importance
of this. To say, as Aristotle does, that there are specific aims and goals
proper to human agency suggests not only that there are certain goods for
which all else is done but also that there is certainly something for everyone
to become. In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle describes this complete
and fulsome good for which all else is done as eudaimonia, and" the virtues
are precisely those qualities the possession of which will enable an individual
to achieve eudaimonia and the lack of which will frustrate his movement
toward that telos" (p. 139).
But, as Macintyre notes, this is misleading. It suggests the virtues are
strictly " a means to the end of achieving the good for man," and Aristotle
meant more than that. Aristotle argued there is a tight internal correspondence between what an agent does and who he or she becomes. He bonds
agency and action, and thus demonstrates that eudaimonia, the life of wellbeing and happiness, is the life of virtue. Aristotle identifies eudaimonia

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317

with being virtuous precisely because he also identifies the character or
quality of a person's life with the determinate effect of his or her own
agency. As 1\'Iaclntyre's later discussion of " practice " illustrates, what is
crucial in this unity is not only that " what constitutes the good for man
is a complete human life lived at its best, and the exercise of the virtues is
a necessary and central part of such a life, not a mere preparatory exercise
to secure such a life " so that " we thus cannot characterize the good for
man adequately without already having made reference to the virtues ";
but also that being virtuous, far from a means to happiness, is precisely the
activity of happiness, the exercise of eudaimonia based on the recognition
that men and women, given their telos, possess a function proper to themselves, a functioning in virtue descriptive of the genuinely good life. The
force of Aristotle's insight, later assumed into Maclntyre's treatment of a
practice, is that eudaimonia, far from being something distinct from virtue
or even the prize of virtue, is descriptive of the completely virtuous life in
which our telos consists.
But Aristotle's account of the telos of human life, influenced as it was by
his metaphysical biology, tends to be too singular. What is required to
make an ethics of virtue intelligible is not a singular end, but the sense of
human life as a quest or a journey in which a variety of forms of evil are
encountered and overcome. The virtues are exactly those qualities that
provide the means to avoid or overcome those evils that prevent human
flourishing. That this sense of life as a quest is missing in Aristotle is due
to his lack of any conception of evil and the sense of the historical that
could only come later in a culture formed by the Bible. Thus, from MacIntyre's perspective, the Middle Ages supplied exactly the conceptual tools
necessary for a satisfying account of the life of virtue.
Yet the Middle Ages, particularly in Aquinas's work, continued Aristotle's
mistaken assumption that the interrelation of the virtues in a single life also
implied their unity. Macintyre suggests that Aristotle's continued support
of the Platonic doctrine of the unity of the virtues was " an unnecessarily
strong conclusion" (147) on his own grounds. What makes Aristotle's
insistence on the unity of the virtues puzzling is his previous emphasis on
the importance of " phronesis " or practical reason in the exercise of virtue.
Phronesis acknowledges the contingent character of the moral life, the fact
that situations and circumstances not only vary but are also important for
accurately discerning the moral quality of any event. Like Aristotle's doctrine of the means, phronesis highlights the painstaking care required to
determine what should be done in whatever lies
us. It is the ability
to recognize in what excellence consists among the conflicting possibilities
and conflicting goods that confront us. Akin to Aquinas's understanding of
prudence, phronesis " comes to mean more generally someone who knows
how to exercise judgment in particular cases. Phronesis is an intellectual
virtue; but it is that intellectual virtue without which none of the virtues

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of character can be exercised" (p. 144). This would seem to acknowledge
that sometimes the contingent, dramatic character of the moral life places
key virtues in conflict and demands either the sacrifice or the incomplete
realization of some good. Phronesis would seem to acknowledge too the
sometimes tragic end to the complete endeavor of moral goodness, but Aristotle finally rejects this. He "precludes tragedy that is not the outcome of
human flaws " (p. 167), and Macintyre credits this to the influence of
Plato, who stressed that" conflict and virtue are mutually incompatible and
exclusive " (p. 132) and that " there exists a cosmic order which dictates
the place of each virtue in a total harmonious scheme of human life " (p.
133). Aristotle, then, not only treats conflict as an evil, but " as an eliminable evil " (p. 147) .
Macintyre sides with Sophocles, who, against Plato, Aristotle, and
Aquinas, rightly saw that behind his dramatic characters' opposition and
conflict was " the conflict of good with good embodied in their encounter
prior to and independent of any individual characteristics " (153). But
it is precisely Sophocles's perspective that is not appreciated by those moderns who emphasize the heterogeneity of the virtues, as well as goods in
general to underline the necessity of choice. They fail to see, as Sophocles
saw, that to choose does not exempt us from the authority of those claims
I must tragically go against. Maclntyre's contention concerning the inherently tragic character of the moral life should be kept in mind by all
who would accuse him of desiring to return to a more harmonious age of
polity. In contrast he is committed to a polity that allows the diversity of
virtue to flourish sufficiently to sustain the conversation necessary for a
truthful morality and politics-a probity that inexorably will involve tragic
conflicts.
The unavoidability of the conflict of the virtues is at least part of the
reason Macintyre insists on the importance of narrative for an ethics of
virtue. " If human life is understood as a progress through harms and dangers, moral and physical, which someone may encounter and overcome in
better and worse ways and with a greater or lesser measure of success, the
virtues will find their place as those qualities the possession and exercise
of which generally tend to success in their enterprise and the vices likewise
as qualities which likewise tend to failure. Each human life will then embody a story whose shape and form will depend upon what is counted as
a harm and danger and upon how success and failure, progress and its
opposite, are understood and evaluated. To answer these questions will also
explicitly and implicitly be to answer the questions as to what the virtues
and vices are " (p. 135) .
The fact that each of our lives is a story, however, does not mean it is a
story that we uniquely create. Rather we find ourselves part of others'
stories as they are part of ours. " The narrative of any one life is part of
an interlocking set of narratives " (203). That such is the case helps ex-

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819

plain why our lives can have unity even though the virtues may conflict.
The unity of a human life is in fact the unity of a narrative quest of a
common good that can only be sought in a joint effort with others. The
search for such a good is not for that which can be adequately characterized
prior to the search, because such characterization comes only through the
process of a community's living tradition. For a tradition, when vital, is
nothing less than a " historically extended, socially embodied argument, and
an argument precisely in part about the goods which constitute that tradition " (fW7) .
Tradition and the virtues are interrelated in a circular manner not unlike
Aristotle's account of how the virtues are acquired. Only on the basis of a
tradition-displayed narrative can we know how to identify and assess the
status of various virtues, but without the virtues a vital tradition cannot be
sustained. In this respect Maclntyre's account is perhaps not sufficiently
developed since he wants to maintain that there is no way to possess the
virtues except as part of a tradition; yet he also wants to maintain that
virtues can, and perhaps must, be known and embodied prior to and as
necessary for the proper functioning of a vital tradition.
Macintyre develops his account of a " practice ", we suspect, in an attempt to avoid this kind of circularity. By a practice Macintyre means
" any coherent and complex form of socially established cooperative human
activity through which goods internal to that form of activity are realized,"
goods that are both appropriate and necessary for human excellence (p.
175). Moreover, a practice, like a virtue, is first of all an activity requisite
for the achievement of those goods worthy of human flourishing. Thus a
practice involves a particular form of life, a life under the authority and
wisdom of those who have become experts in virtue, because " its goods can
only be achieved by subordinating ourselves to the best standard so far
achieved, and that entails subordinating ourselves within the practice in
our relationship to other practitioners " (p. 178) . That such is the case is
but a reminder that practices have a history and that the standards of a
practice are thus not immune from criticism and change. Practices never
have their goals fixed for all time; rather their goals are transmitted by the
history of the activity. That is why practices, important as they are, must
be embedded in and made intelligible in terms of a longer history through
which the practice is conveyed (207) .
Though Maclntyre's account of a practice is formally clear, there remains
a good deal of ambiguity about what would count_ as a practice and why.
For example, Macintyre says architecture is a practice but bricklaying is
not and that playing football is a practice but throwing a football with skill
is not. But what is the basis for these judgments? Certainly architecture
and the game of football are more inclusive, but he has not told us why
inclusiveness should be a necessary basis to distinguish a practice from mere
skill or technique. No doubt Macintyre wants such discriminations to turn

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BOOK REVIEWS

on activities that are "ends in themselves," whose goods are internal to
their doing, but even on such a criteria it is not clear why bricklaying
(which for some practitioners is next to an art) could not count as a practice. Such questions might appear trivial except for the close relationship
Macintyre wants to maintain between the concept of a practice and that of
a virtue. It may well be that Maclntyre's account of a practice actually
weakens his case because there is nothing he says about a practice that perhaps would not be better treated as intrinsic to virtue itself.
Indeed, the account Macintyre provides of the relation of virtues and
practices is a bit confusing. Virtues, he tells us, are necessary to prevent
the perversion of practices by institutions, which, although necessary for
sustaining practices, also constantly threaten to pervert the practice by
subsuming the internal goods of the practice to the external rewards offered
by institutions. Architects, for example, are constantly tempted to qualify
their art for money or status. So without " justice, courage and truthfulness,
practices could not resist the corrupting power of institutions " (p. 181) ;
yet Macintyre also suggests that the " virtues need initially to be defined
and explained with reference to the notion of practice " (p. 187) . It seems
clear that Macintyre is not identifying practice with virtue, but precisely
what is their relation remains elusive. That such is the case may be less a
criticism of Maclntyre's account than an indication that the relation of
virtue and practice is in fact elusive. At the very least, however, MacIntyre's analysis of practices serves as a much-needed reminder that
"morality," contra much of modern philosophical accounts, gains its
intelligibility and is embodied in the non-moral aspects of our lives.
We suspect the ambiguity surrounding Maclntyre's account of the relation of practice and virtue is the result of his attempt to treat them abstracted from any specific narrative account and/or tradition. For, as
Macintyre has eloquently argued, the meaning of a good life cannot be
known unless that question is posed within a context in which the goods
of a life have already been embodied. Or what does a practice mean outside
a narrative that provides an interpretation for what the virtuous person
should be practicing? Interestingly, in several passages Macintyre acknowledges the need for a specific narrative to provide an intelligible account of
the virtues. At the end of chapter fourteen he writes: " The question is: is
it rationally justifiable to conceive of each human life as a unity, so that
we may try to specify each such life as having its good and so that we may
understand the virtues as having their function in enabling an individual
to make of his or her life one kind of unity rather than another? " (p. 189).
Later Macintyre argues that every action tells a story, and that therefore
to deprive people of a narrative, a story form by which their behavior becomes not only intelligible but meaningful, is to "leave them unscripted,
anxious stutterers in their actions or in their words " (p. 201). The question then is: Which story makes us morally eloquent? Macintyre admits

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321

the force of this question. " Once again," he writes, " it turns out that any
specific account of the virtues presupposes an equally specific account of the
narrative structure and unity of a human life and vice versa " (p. 226) .
And earlier he said " belief in the virtues being of a certain kind and belief
in human life exhibiting a certain narrative order are internally connected "
(p. 135) . But the closest Macintyre comes to identifying the narrative
form requisite for the resolution of After Virtue is in the homage he pays
his heroine, Jane Austen. Macintyre admires Jane Austen for two reasons.
First, Austen did. not crusade to change society; rather, she " tried to discover enclaves for the life of the virtues within it " (p. 222), and at the
end of After Virtue Macintyre pleads for the same thing. Secondly, Jane
Austen, he notes, wrote ironic comedy rather than tragedy, and that was
because she was a Christian. In Austen Aristotelianism and Christianity
merge (p. 223), and in that union Austen has not only an understanding of
the virtues but a narrative form with vision enough to sustain it.
Macintyre admires Jane Austen, but he admires her from afar. While
much in After Virtue hints at Macintyre's profound sympathy with an Aristotelian virtue-morality informed by the vision of Christianity, nowhere
does he explicitly identify the Christian story as his own, and that may
explain why at the end of After Virtue a sense of tragedy remains. Macintyre rejects the " modern political order " (p. 237) , and he mourns the
status of morality today, but what alternative does he offer? In the final
two paragraphs of After Virtue he makes a twilight plea for the " construction of new forms of community within which the moral life could be sustained so that both morality and civility might survive the coming ages of
barbarism and darkness," a darkness indeed that is already upon us. But
what does this mean? Is it merely a final refuge, a place of solace amidst
an encroaching darkness? Is it a capitulation to an unavoidable tragedy?
Does it signal the impossibility of ever escaping the emotivism Macintyre
disdains, making his call for a new St. Benedict merely another assertion of
the same thing? Without some specification of what narrative Macintyre
espouses, his community offers little hope, and that's because, without a
sense of who we are and what we ought to become, it is difficult to determine what we ought to do. Until then, After Virtue remains trapped in
the very tragedy it fears, and its retelling as a story of our lives is frightening.
That such is the case is but a tribute to Maclntyre's achievement in After
Virtue. For he has labored hard, and we think fo_r the most part successfully, to help us understand the character of our world. That we lack the
moral and political resources to re-embody the ethics of virtue is hardly
Macintyre's fault. Yet, as he points out, if we are in as bad a state as that,
pessimism is a cultural luxury that we must dispense with if we are to survive these times. But then we at least have to press Macintyre harder to

BOOK REVIEWS

tell us on what he bases his hope to sustain the struggle to be people of
virtue.
STANLEY HAUERWAS AND PAUL WADELL
University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame, Indiana

Discerning the Way: A Theology of the Jewish-Christian Real,ity. By PAUL
M. VAN BUREN. New York: Seabury Press, 1980. Pp.
+indices of
Biblical References and of Names. $rn.50.
Paul van Buren's compassion for Jews in their great suffering and dying
under German National Socialism is pervasive in his book. His assertion of
God's continuing presence in Jewish history and especially in the Jewish
reconstruction of a home in the biblical " land that God had given them "
forms the basis of his new attempt to propose a "theology of the JewishChristian reality."
Van Buren's interpretation of Jewish theology and God's purposes for
contemporary Judaism is best left to Jewish critics. This review proceeds
from a traditional Christian view of the meaning of Christian faith based
on Christian Scriptures, and Christian theology of both the Being of God
and the being of humankind. Van Buren expresses his assumption many
times in his work that traditional ways of interpreting Christianity are
meaningless in this modern or post-modern era. He rejects traditionally
defined and accepted truths about the divinity of Jesus, the authority of
the New Testament, the objective reality of a Church, the metaphysical
reality of a Trinity of distinct Persons in the One God.
Theology for van Buren is not a science based on the incontrovertible
truths of faith. " Theology is ... , as I understand it, a contribution to-in
the form of critical reflection on-a conversation in ipso itinere ... among
members of the Christian church concerning the Way on which they have
found themselves " (p. 4) . He sustains the metaphor of the Way throughout the book. His purpose is to contribute to this conversation, to encourage fresh thinking about self-understanding (ecclesiology) and about God
and the" foundations of our faith" (the Bible and revelation) (pp. 4-5). He
proceeds in his " conversation " to place today's Christians on the same level
as those believers in Jesus who lived with Jesus, and those believers in
as those believers in Jesus who lived with Jesus, and those believers in Jesus
who composed the New Testament. They were the founders of tradition and
authors who were preaching and writing their works as interpretations of ongoing history in the light of their immediate experience. They reinterpreted
what they had received from Jewish tradition in the light of their belief in

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323

Jesus. They were no more inspired than those who preach and write today
reinterpreting their writings of the Apostolic era. Thus van Buren rejects the
Bible as normative for theology. His "conversation" in his new book could
be (depending on' uptake 'by the community) just as valid and just as Christian as the" conversation" of Mark, Luke, Matthew, John, et al. (pp. 5-6). He
seems to remove from the Bible any fixed, intelligible content. Whenever
anyone says, " the Bible says, " that is an interpretation of something in the
Bible. It is not an authentic meaning discernible in the Bible. The Bible is
part of " the historical ' process,' of which our existence as well as its various
books and layers are a part. The Bible was no more written to provide
concepts than it was to be a sourcebook of types and symbols " (p. 6) .
Pointedly throughout his book van Buren calls the commonly designated
"New Testament" "The Apostolic Writings." He does this to emphasize
his rejection of the Christian Scriptures as "New" over against the Jewish
as " Old." It is his thesis that much of Christian " conversation " (theology) has led to Christian unchristianity to Jews. The claims about God
within Judaism and within Christianity are not mutually exclusive (p. 33) .
To claim that the God of the Christians was Israel's God leads to contempt
of the Jews by Christians (p. 34). On this point of Christianity's unchristian treatment of Jews in their historical coexistence one can only agree
with and praise van Buren for his attempts to promote loving Jewish-Christian coexistence under God and looking towards the completion of God's
creation.
But the method he uses cannot be embraced by those who conceive of
the Church as proposer and guardian of a tradition that is anchored in an
unrepeatable, divinely truthful Scripture. For van Buren there is no real
authority. His continued references to "the church" are all but meaningless. Yet he claims (p. 7) : " It does not follow from this that we intend
our claims to be only relative or subjective. Of course the truth we seek
must be the truth as we see it, but we seek the truth of God, Creator of
heaven and earth. We claim that a Way has been shown to us and that we
are called to walk this road for the sake of the whole of creation." Then
he makes an equation, or a proportion: the writers of the Bible are to their
stories about Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, kings, prophets, etc., as we are
to our " conversation " or interpretation of present history for the discern..
ment of God's Way. What has been written before us is only as valid or
valuable as what we can make of it to interpret and bring to our times the
intention of God in creating. For van Buren there is no charism of inspiration because it is not experientially verifiable. All " conversationalists "
who have preceded us are valuable insofar as we can now rejoice in what
helps us to live Christianly. But we must reject what "hinders our walking
our assigned stretch" of the Way (p. 16). Our journey through history
can be influenced by past " conversations " when they have had " uptake "
and become part of " theology " (p. Q3). On our journey we carry Old

BOOK REVIEWS

Testament, New Testament and other books like "Plato, Aristotle, Kant,
and Hegel, and ... these too have been turned to as authorities."
Van Buren's " conversation " tries to accommodate Christian belief in
the Trinity to Jewish belief in One unique God by making the Trinity a
threefold modal expression of the unique God of the Jewish Scriptures. The
Holy Spirit is the Gentile way of understanding the Jewish Shekhinah (Presence) of God (p. 75). The "Spirit is one of the names or functions of
God " (p. 57) . Jesus as Son of God is Son as many Jews were Sons of God
before Him; as Jews are elder sons and daughters of God; and as Christians
are younger sons and daughters of God through Jesus (pp. 80-81). The
demand that Jesus be equal to and with the Father (God) is a "strangely
typical concern of the West's about rank and power" (p. 76). Van Buren
rejects the kenosis of God by the incarnation of the Son (God) in that
human being known in history as Jesus, the Jew (p. 78). "Did Jesus have
any unique connection with the Father? Yes, in the precise sense of being
the one .Jew through whom salvation came to the Gentiles, providing entry
into God's way ahead in history of His creation. Jesus as Son was indeed
unique as God's effective call to the Gentiles " (p. 82).
Van Buren approaches the mystery of God from the point of view of
linguistic analysis. He continues in this new book to try to understand the
language of theology about God's mysterious Being according to the methodology of logical empiricism. This implies that, since God is not part of
the physical world which humans sensibly experience, no theological assertion about God can be verified or denied by reference to human experience
of this physical world. Thus the mystery of God, and His salvation of
humankind through His Son, mysteriously incarnate, remains radically impenetrable to human search for understanding. All religious language that
accepts by faith God's mystery and tries to talk about it is for today cognitive nonsense. In this book Jesus is still simply that Jewish man "existing
for others." His resurrection is not physical-metaphysical-supernatural return of the person known as Jesus from the tomb. Rather it is the contagion
of His life and energy catching on in the life of His apostles. Resurrection
is His example continuing on in them after His death and burial.
In Discerning the Way van Buren's basic point of view has changed very
little. But we can hope that the redemption accomplished by Jesus (a theological reality for Catholic theologians rejected by van Buren-pp. 187190) will manifest itself in our time in the practical love preached by Jesus
in Mt 5:21-24; 88-48, and preached by God to the Jews in Leviticus 19:18:
" You shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord."
THOMAS

Providence College
Providence, Rhode Island

L. FALLON, O.P.

BOOK REVIEWS

Philosopher at Large: An Intellectual Autobiography. By MORTIMER J.
ADLER. New York: Macmillan, 1977. Pp. 349 with index. $12.95.
The renaissance of the study of the philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas
which began in the mid-nineteenth century and ended in the mid-twentieth
"scholastica tertia" has its own history, now being unfolded in some detail.
Within it, however, only bits of the story of the shape which this revival
took in the United States in the second quarter of the twentieth century
have come to light. Publishing records and histories of higher education,
especially Roman Catholic, relate some institutional facts about it. Anecdotes and random facts reveal its power in depth: Thomas Merton's
reading and study of St. Thomas, especially with Daniel Walsh at Columbia, matured his conversion and monastic vocation. Graduate students at
Columbia and Chicago, after reading St. Thomas, became Catholics, even
priests, and went on as thinkers and writers to exercise a large influence in
the intellectual and religious life of the American Catholic community.
Without much faith in the project, Bennett Cerf amiably agreed one day
to the suggestion of an official of the Archdiocese of New York, then neighbors with Random House in the Villard House, to publish The Basic Works
of St. Thomas Aquinas, the sales success of which then amazed all. Walter
Farrell's four volume "A Companion to the Summa" outstripped all sales
expectations and gave birth to an industry: "Theology for the Laity," lectures on St. Thomas, and created a genre:" College Theology."
In 1946 Benziger Brothers re-published in three volumes a translation of
the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas which was first put in print in 1916,
and could never keep it in print after that.
Of the reasons for this unique American revival, and of the personalities
who fueled and nourished it, almost nothing systematic has been written.
For this reason Mortimer J. Adler's autobiography Philosopher at Large
will supply a great need. For during twenty years of that renaissance Adler,
a young professor of philosophy at Columbia and later at the University
of Chicago, was the most fascinating and perhaps the most influential figure
of the American Thomist revival. In addresses, articles, and books, public
discussion about law, education, psychology, and the central problems of
philosophical theory, and often in hot controversy, his espousal of St.
Thomas so dominated the period as for some to give it a name.
Philosopher at Large is not autobiography in the usual sense; it is solely
the story of Adler's intellectual development and activity. Little of his
personal life is revealed; the year of his birth is not -mentioned, nor are incidents of his childhood (except in brief summary at the end of the book).
Almost nothing of his marriages or his children, or of his religious convictions (except a brief summary of reasons he did not become a Catholic) is
mentioned.
The narrative begins with a fifteen year old boy reading John Stuart Mill

BOOK REVIEWS

in the editorial offices of the old New York Sun, and advances steadily
through his career at Columbia as student and teacher, dwelling especially
on his association with John Erskine in the General Honors ("Classics of
Western Civilization ") program. It takes up his fruitful friendship with
Robert M. Hutchins, then at Yale and later at Chicago. The book describes
the prolonged battle of curriculum reform at the University of Chicago, his
role in the The Great Books, St. John's College, the Syntopicon, the Encyclopedia Britannica, Aspen, The Institute for Philosophical Research, his
books on philosophy, law, and letters, and the incredibly successful How to
Read a Boole through over fifty years to the present. He was so frequently
involved in controversy and public debate at almost every stage that Carl
van Doren wrote of him:
" The ancient garden where most men
Step daintily, in specimen dust
He bulldozes; plows deep;
Moves earth .... "

From Philosophy at Large an historian of Thomism in America will piece
together the events of 1930-1945 which made up the Adler period. They
began in New York at Columbia on a Saturday morning, the first of many,
in 1927, when Adler, Arthur Rubin, and Scott Buchanan, curious as to why
their course in the history of philosophy had passed from Hellenistic philosophy to Descartes, resolved to read Aquinas. They soon discovered that
there was no Aquinas in the Columbia University Library, nor at Amherst,
nor Oxford, nor Harvard. They learned from Richard McKeon of the 1916
Benziger editions of the Summa and Contra Gentiles and on Saturday mornings read aloud together copies purchased in a religious goods store in downtown New York. The cool even-handed rationality of Aquinas captured
them. From that beginning came a large output of books, articles, and addresses which established the names of Thomas Aquinas and Mortimer
Adler in the public consciousness.
His " Thomist Period " and his committed and enthusiastic advocacy of
St. Thomas came to an abrupt end in the late 1940's with his alienation
from other Thomist scholars on three issues: democracy, on which he argued
that democracy and not a benevolent monarchy was the most human form
of government (the argument was advanced in a series of articles with Walter Farrell, O.P., in the pages of The Thomist); species; and the existence
of God. (In a paper in the Maritain volume of The Thomist he argued that,
while it might be possible to construct a proof for the existence of God, St.
Thomas had not succeeded in doing so with his Quinque Viae). The reaction
of other Thomists to his opinions on these three questions was so fierce, he
reports, that he withdrew from the discussion to turn his mind from Thomism to other concerns.
Philosopher at Large will serve another purpose also for the historian of

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Thomism: an unraveling of the reasons why there was a period, however
brief, in the history of American philosophy during which Thomists played
an important part and particularly an Adler period in American Thomism.
What brought the brilliant young Jewish-American philosopher and St.
Thomas so fruitfully together? It will appear from the book that it had as
much to do with the quality of the mind and way of learning of Mortimer
Adler as it did with St. Thomas's vision of the real. Without reference to
his interest in St. Thomas, in many places in the book Adler describes the
modes in which he thinks, learns, and writes. He admits to possessing an
especially analytic cast of mind. He mentions " the habit of cataloguing and
memorizing which became perhaps the least unattractive of my analerotic
compulsions" and his "passion for logic," his predilection for unvarnished
statements of an analysis or argument, and his possessing a kind of mind
he called "merescopic " (as opposed to holoscopic): " an ability to smell
out in detail what distinguished even similar things."
Because the texts of Thomas all had these same qualities, Adler became
a Thomist by natural disposition and attraction. The texts of Aquinas
which he discovered in his early twenties must have seemed to him like
Chapman's Homer to John Keats. Some people are trained, and even reluctantly, in Thomism; Mortimer Adler seemed to have come to it like a
man falling in love.
After Adler turned to other things but not primarily because of his absence, Thomism in America was never the same. In the post-war period
new interests attracted Thomists: theologians did less philosophy: they
turned first to the scriptures, then to historical criticism and hermeneutics. ,
After twenty years away, however, Adler returned briefly in 1967-68 to
writing on Thomistic topics in The New Scholasticisrn and to publishing
books on human nature, the philosophy of Aristotle, and on God. Philosopher at Large was perhaps his chief work.
A final note for historians: Four Dominicans at the Dominican House of
Studies, Washington, in a photograph (after page
are incorrectly
identified. They are: Bernard Walker, 0.P., then Prior of the House of
Studies; Walter Farrell, 0.P., Regent of Studies and Editor of the Thomist;
Robert Slavin, 0.P., professor of philosophy at the Catholic University and
Editor of the Thomist; and Arthur McMahon, O.P., then Procurator of the
House of Studies.
MARK HEATH, O.P.
Dominican House of Studies
Washington, D.C.

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Rationality and Religious Belief. Edited by C. F. DELANEY. Notre Dame:
University of Notre Dame Press, 1979. Pp. 168. $4.95 paper.
This volume gathers together eight original essays by well-known philosophers and philosophical theologians, concentrating on what remains a
central problem in contemporary philosophy of religion-namely, the possibility (and character) of a universal standard of rationality and its relation
to religious belief. The number and variety of the essays, as well as the
quality of the contributors, make it impossible to do justice to the arguments advanced by each; so I will make some general comments and then
focus on several of the essays.
The purpose of the volume is, in the words of the editor, C. F. Delaney,
to remind participants in the contemporary debate on rationality and religious belief that the question should be seen as being " as much about
rationality as about religion " and " should address religion concretely as
a human practice rather than abstractly as a system of propositions." The
special merit of the book lies in its presentation of these reminders through
a wide spectrum of approaches, ranging from technical analytical inquiries
to what one might call more ' wholistic ' (e.g., more historically or ' existentially ' oriented) approaches. On the one hand, two of the essays are
fine examples of detailed formal analyses: George Mavrodes discusses problems generated by the possibility of certain combinations of truth-value and
rationality; G. E. M. Anscombe points to distinctions between' believing X
that p ' (or ' believing someone ') and either ' believing in ' someone or
' believing what someone says.' Illustrating an approach that lies at the
other end of the spectrum we find a sensitive and suggestive consideration
by Langdon Gilkey of how issues of estrangement and the ontological structure of being and history are relevant to the problem of rationality and
religious belief, as well as an exploration by Frederick Crosson of St. Augustine's passage from the religious realm through the philosophical to the
realm of faith. The remaining four essays in the volume seem to me to
range between these two kinds of approach, and in order to limit the review
I will comment in detail only on them.
The first reminder the volume intends to offer-namely, that the question
of rationality and religious belief is as much a question about the character
of rationality as about the character of religious belief-is put forward most
directly in the essays by John E. Smith and Alvin
who challenge
in differing ways the idea that there is an unproblematical notion of " rationality" with respect to which religion can be judged. Smith's essay,
"Faith, Belief and the Problem of Rationality in Religion," is an intriguing
attempt to combine both a critique of 'Wittgensteinian fideism' and the
suggestion (at first glance similar to claims made by Wittgensteinian fideists)
that " legitimate comparisons " are only made " between systems of discourse of the same logical type " (57). Smith's summary critique of fideism

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is not novel; more interesting is his claim that, while such a retreat to fideism is the unfortunate outcome of an unnecessary capitulation to a standard
of rationality " derivative from science and common sense" (50), it is both
necessary and possible to have a standard of rationality which is neither
prejudicial to religion from the outset nor sui generis or internal to religion.
(It is interesting to compare Smith's essay with D. Z. Phillips's similar
attempt to find a criterion which is neither totally internal to religion nor
totally external; cf. " Religious Belief and Language Games.")
For Smith, the determination of a standard of rationality is, contrary to
Wittgensteinian fideism, not something that each enterprise can do for itself
-rather, it is an" inescapably philosophical, affair, which must be argued in
philosophical terms" (57). This requires, however, the recovery of a notion
of philosophy which is both " constructive " and has " cognitive reach "
(and here the insights concerning experience and intelligibility suggested by
process thought, existentialism, and American pragmatism point the way).
Such a philosophy can provide a standard which is " appropriate to, and
commensurate with, the nature of religious belief" (59); such a standard is
not external because of the " identical element " in religious, scientific and
philosophical frameworks (63), or because of the " point of contact " between philosophy and religion (59). It is obviously illegitimate to attempt
to assess the rationality of religious belief in terms of its conformity to a
standard derived from science and common sense. Instead we can legitimately only make " critical comparisons between beliefs within the universe
of discourse established by the religions themselves and their secular counterparts" (e.g. TM or Marxism); such comparison would concern "relative
coherence, comprehensiveness, degree of illumination, and fidelity to experience " (57) .
But it is precisely here that I find myself needing some clarification. On
what basis are the " critical comparisons " actually critical? Is the only
appraisal possible that of comparing the religions among themselves to
determine adequacy to what they consider to be coherence or illumination
or fidelity to experience? It remains unclear whether what is being proposed
is that religion (or religions) be appraised by a standard taken from philosophy (though philosophy of a particular kind which is not a priori prejudicial to religion) , or that religion is not assessable at all and religions are
only assessable intramurally, so to speak. If appraisals can only be made
within " the same logical type," then philosophy cannot provide substantive
norms for judging religion (s); however, if philosophy provides norms only
in a formal sense, with the substantive content of the norm determined
within the religious universe of discourse (i.e., a norm of coherence or fidelity
to experience, but ' what counts as' coherence or fidelity to experience is
determined solely by the religious context) , then how have we advanced
beyond the position put forward long ago by Winch and other Wittgensteinian fideists? Smith's essay addresses the question of the relation be-

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tween transcontextual norms of rationality and properly context-dependent
norms from a different perspective from that found, for example, in the
social science discussions of the question, and so contributes to the discussion, but the essay (perhaps inevitably, because of its brevity) raises
more questions than answers.
Plantinga's "Is Belief in God Rational? " begins by noting the impossibility of any definition providing non-trivial necessary and sufficient conditions for rational belief. Plantinga then turns to his main project: a
consideration of the implications of a (Cliffordian) claim that being based
on " sufficient evidence " is the mark of a rational belief. Such a claim implies that there is a foundational set of beliefs with respect to which the
belief whose rationality is in question stands or fails to stand in an appropriate relation (viz., 'evident with respect to'). Plantinga's crucial move
is to question the assumption of the "Cliffordian foundationalist " that
" not just any belief can properly be in the foundations of a person's noetic
structure " (13). Plantinga's inquiry into the specific conditions that might
warrant inclusion in the foundations is guided by his question whether
belief that God exists might not be a possible candidate for such inclusion,
for that would be one quick way of insuring its rationality (rn) .
On the Cliffordian foundationalist model, the characteristics that seem to
legitimate a belief's place in the foundations of a noetic structure are "selfevidence" and "incorrigibility".
Plantinga questions both whether only
such propositions can be "properly basic ", and whether Cliffordian foundational beliefs themselves meet that requirement. Since in the end the judgment of what is incorrigible rests on that of self-evidence, it is imperative
for the foundationalist to defend his judgment that a particular proposition
is or is not self-evident, and here the distinction between " seems self-evident " and " is self-evident " becomes crucial in challenging the Cliffordian
to justify the rejection of any putative candidate for noetic foundations.
What lurks behind the Cliffordian's assumption that most propositions
which seem self-evident actually are self-evident is, Plantinga argues, a
commitment to the " trustworthiness of his noetic equipment " (24) . Thus,
belief in the basic reliability of reason is foundational, yet is neither selfevident nor incorrigible. Moreover, belief that only self-evident and incorrigible propositions are properly basic is neither self-evident nor incorrigible.
This attempt to expose "intellectual imperialism" for what it really is
undergirds Plantinga's final judgment that taking belief in God as basic,
which is at least descriptively what believers do, is not contrary to reason.
The essay is an impressive analysis of the requirement of " sufficient evidence " and succeeds in shaking one's confidence that 'of course we all
know what it means for an ordinary belief to be rational-it's religious
beliefs that are a problem.' But I find myself perplexed about the strategy
used here, or perhaps about the implications of the strategy. It is unclear
to me whether Plantinga is arguing that there are no norms for appropriate

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foundations and therefore nothing can be rejected as inappropriate, or that
the only norm left to Cliffordians is "seems to be self-evident " and therefore religious belief can, for some people at least, satisfy that norm as well
as any Cliffordian candidate. In either case, if I understand it rightly, the
argument seems to reduce to the not uncommon one that since, after all,
something must be taken without evidence, ' on faith,' in any case, then it
is not irrational to begin one's noetic structure wherever one wants, or include in one's set of foundations whatever one wants. Leaving aside the
question whether such foundationalism is really the only way to analyze
the requirement of " sufficient evidence," and leaving aside problems with
foundationalism as such, it is not clear to me why it should be thought that,
because noetic structures start with ' ungrounded givens,' therefore all ungrounded beliefs should be equally legitimate. Might there not be characteristics possessed by some ungrounded beliefs but not by others, in such a
way as to distinguish or discriminate evaluatively between, e.g., belief in
the trustworthiness of my faculties and belief that " there is such a person
as God " (7) ? Candidates for such characteristics come readily to mind,
and they at least need to be taken account of before one would be forced
to conclude that Plantinga has in fact succeeded in distilling the Cliffordian
notion of rational belief down to its necessary and sufficient conditions. In
sum, whether or not we are forced to accept such a minimalist account of
rational foundations as Plantinga proposes to be the sufficient account implicit in the Cliffordian ethics of belief, the essay is probably the most convincing statement of the case one is likely to come across.
David Burrell's approach to the question of the relation between rational..
ity and religious belief centers on his attempt to provide further clarification
of the notions of " justification " and " foundation " of religious belief. In
brief, Burrell points out that both terms are ambiguous, capable of pointing
in two directions; he argues, however, that the justification appropriate to
religious belief is "retrospective " rather than "prospective", and that the
quest for foundations of religious belief will be better understood on an
' archeological ' model than on the model of building-construction. Burrell's necessarily sketchy examination of the idea of religious justification in
Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas, and Kant suggests that the religiously appropriate idea of " proof " can only be formally similar to that of showing that
the presupposition of the explanatory enterprise (i.e., unity) evokes a question (i.e., whence?). This" predispos[es] one to religious belief" in the sense
of providing justification or foundation for the realm of theological discourse
(providing a " grammatical beachhead ") without thereby establishing the
existence of God (104). Assertions within that realm, however, can be
justified only retrospectively-only
from within the religious way of life.
Justification for religious belief cannot take the form of "providing independent access to divinity,'' or of providing reasons for adopting the belief
that God exists; rather it can only be a matter of retrospective support for

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maintaining religious belief. The role of reason is to locate the presuppositions of practices already engaged in (e.g., explanation and religion) and to
look for " analogies " between the presuppositions. It is not only impossible,
but also illegitimate, according to Burrell, to try to show that God exists in
order to warrant engagement in religious practices-on the contrary, only
such engagement yields an appreciation of the connection between religious
practice and the conviction of the divine reality, and that appreciation is
necessary if one is to be able to appreciate analogies between the two presuppositions (unity and God}.
The essay contributes to the contemporary discussion in a number of
respects; the explicit presentation of a simple but crucial (and seldom adequately appreciated} set of distinctions concerning " justification " would in
itself make it worth reading. However, the essay remains somewhat unclear
in certain ways-in part, I think, because here, as in most discussions of
this sort, a number of distinctions receive insufficient attention. For example, the distinction between ' religion ' and ' belief in God ' can make a
difference to the plausibility of such arguments concerning presuppositions.
Secondly, "justification" can refer either to reasoning which is sufficient,
or to reasoning which is relevant though not sufficient. Thirdly, the essay
raises the question of the symmetry or asymmetry between " justification "
and critical appraisal. What does the claim that the quest for foundations
is best understood as the attempt to locate presuppositions of practices already engaged in imply concerning the possibility and kinds of critical
appraisal? Acknowledging limitations on length imposed on such essays, I
feel that attention to such matters would add considerably to our understanding of the specific proposal offered.
Philosophers of religion concerned with the ' ethics of belief ' and ' will
to believe' debates will find R. M. Adams's essay especially interesting. In
it Adams approaches the theme of the volume by considering the relevance
of moral arguments to the question of the rationality of religious belief, and
in particular addresses the issue of practical arguments for belief. Adams
makes explicit an important distinction between theoretical moral arguments and practical moral arguments for theistic belief: a theoretical moral
argument for theistic belief has an ethical premise and leads to a conclusion
about the truth or probability of theism; a practical moral argument, on the
other hand, offers practical or ethical reasons for " believing that God exists." In other words, a practical moral argument bears not on the content
of the belief, but on the act of believing (to go back to a distinction made
earlier in the volume by Mavrodes}. A practical moral argument provides
practical reasons for adopting, cultivating, or maintaining theistic belief
without necessarily saying anything at all about the truth or probable truth
of the belief. In Section One Adams discusses a theoretical moral argument
for theism, sketchily arguing that a ' modified divine command ' theory of
right and wrong is plausible and entails the existence of God. In Section

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333

Two he gives Kantian examples of both a theoretical moral argument and
a practical moral argument for theism, but concentrates on elaborating the
latter and then defending it against the charge that it cannot be " right, and
intellectually honest, to believe something, or try to believe it, for the sake
of any practical advantage, however noble " (128) . After providing two
examples of cases where such believing for moral advantage is "plausibly"
approved of, he strengthens the restrictions on such cases by adding to
James's criteria of intellectual ambiguity and momentous/forced option, a
third restriction. This restriction--'Viz., " It would be irrational to accept a
belief on the ground that it gives you a reason for doing something you want
to do "-is meant to suggest that the rationality of trying to believe something depends on the independently ascertainable value of and commitment
to the endeavor with respect to which the belief is seen as morally advantageous (IQ9). That is, if one concludes that it would be demoralizing not
to believe in a Guarantor of a moral world order, then believing in God is
rational as long as one is antecedently convinced of the need to be moral
and is only seeking " emotional undergirding" for the enterprise to which
one is already strongly committed. Such believing is then rational-i.e., a
rational thing to do. What is really being defended by Adams is the rationality of religious action-the action of cultivating or maintaining religious
believing. And insofar as others have challenged the rationality of such
action, Adams seems to be defending it by suggesting that the rationality
of religious believing can be achieved independently of truth-considerations
because rationality of action concerns appropriate relations between means
and ends.
However, several questions remain. Insofar as Adams was addressing the
question of whether it was " right and intellectually honest " to engage in
such instrumental believing, it is not clear that guaranteeing the rationality
of such action in terms of appropriate means/ends relations is all that he
needs (or intended). One can after all still ask whether truth-seekingrational believing (as opposed to pragmatically-rational believing) is a
prima-facie moral duty. It is not clear whether in this essay Adams is denying that it is in fact a prima-facie moral duty, or whether he is suggesting
a case where such a duty, though admittedly a prima-facie one, is overridden by other moral considerations (e.g., the consequences of demoralization).
By thus shifting the focus from theoretical rationality to practical rationality, Adams's essay adds another perspective to a volume already rich
in the variety of perspectives it opens up on the problem of the relation
between rationality and religious belief. The volume should be of interest
to any philosopher of religion concerned with the problem it addresses both
because it provides a valuable continuation of several discussions found in
Reason and Religion (ed. Stuart Brown, 1977) and because it covers a wide

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spectrum of approaches to the problem. For both these reasons it can also
be useful in graduate seminars on the topic.
M. JAMIE FERREIRA
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, Virginia

Nietzsche. By MARTIN HEIDEGGER. Volume I," The Will to Power as Art."
Translated by David F. Krell. New York: Harper and Row, 1979.
Pp. 263. $12.95.
Martin Heidegger. By GEORGE STEINER. New York: Penguin, 1980. Pp.
173. $3.95.
The first of these books continues the Harper and Row series of translations; the second is a study of Heidegger by a distinguished writer and
interpreter of culture.
The translation is one of three volumes presenting in English the two
large German books published by Verlag Neske, Nietzsche/Heidegger. Some
of the final sections of this German text have appeared in other collections
of Heidegger's writings in English; a further essay on Nietzsche from Holzwege is available separately in English. David Krell's first book of translation gives us approximately half of the first German volume. But nothing
about Heidegger is simple. Originally the material in the Nietzsche books
came from four lecture courses delivered at Freiburg im Breisgau. Aclded
to this were essays and sketches of articles written on the great nineteenth
century philosopher. In the early 1950s Heidegger worked these drafts into
publishable form, and the collected, refined sections appeared in 1961. This
new translation presents the section on" Der Wille zur Macht als Kunst,"
deriving from a lecture course in 1936/37 and revised for publication.
Heidegger's approach to a great philosopher is, of course, to retrieve him
out of both the glory and the obfuscation of Western metaphysics. He accomplishes the philosopher's survival by selecting passages and then interpreting them. Nietzsche's voluminous but unpolished Der Will zur Macht
impressed the young Heidegger. That book, like Heidegger's commentary, is
aphoristic and unfocused. From Heidegger then we receive essays on what
he considers to be worthy of attention in Nietzsche and on the deeper
impact of Nietzsche's words (or meaningy for the history and issue (Being)
of philosophy. The book is ultimately about Heidegger, for we find the
enduring question of Being and being, the interest in recurrence and eschatological historicity, the critique of Platonism and of subsequent Christian
philosophy. The reader soon sees that Heidegger is not interested in either

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what Nietzsche actually held or in the solution of the Heideggerian problematic. Nietzsche is a Denkweg, a path for thinking, a clearing where thinking can take place.
We are struck, from the point of view of the history of philosophy, by
two interesting confrontations with the past. First, Heidegger explores
Nietzsche's ancestry in German idealism and argues that it was not Schopenhauer (a parasite on the tree of idealism) who fostered Nietzsche but
Hegel and, above all, Schelling. In Schelling the transcendental philosophy
of Kant and Fichte broke through into the abyss of the absolute-which
abyss was not lucid reason but seething will. With Schelling the philosophy
of the will began-a will which was more than intellectual appetite, spirit
itself. Second, there is a lengthy discussion of Plato and of certain Platonic
writings through whose genius and torpor in Western metaphysics Heidegger ranges.
If the book is a study of Heidegger rather than Nietzsche, it is also a
study of the entire history of Western philosophy and not of a single philosopher. What Heidegger is doing here and elsewhere is elucidating the
historical and cultural context of a form of philosophical inquiry. The approach intrigues the reader but does not satisfy.
Professor Krell's translation is bright and readable; his background material is valuable, and the " Analysis " will be of special help to students
both of the reception of Nietzsche after 1900 and of the milieu of Heidegger's thought in the 1930s. Sometimes there is an Anglo-Saxon brittleness
in the translation: a translator needs to remember that, while Heidegger is
neological and dense, he is not as abstract as one has been led to believe.
A translation should produce not only his thought but something of a language which is both poetic and tough. English translators of Heidegger
often seem to be on the edge of a positivism or scholasticism; glossaries may
appear as claims to definitive equations. One can question translating
Rausch as " rapture," Zerissenheit as " abscission," Fug as " jointure," Bauten as" halls." Nonetheless, the volume brings light to German philosophy
during the first half of this century. Readers will hope that Krell in
his next volumes will produce further analyses and appendices-but not
glossaries.
George Steiner's book is one of a series of introductions to " Modern
l\!Iasters." All who read Steiner's essays on culture and literature will approach this small book on Heidegger with expectations of both enlightenment and pleasure. The book will not disappoint_ them in its verve and
lucidity of language. The reader is quickly caught up in a wide world of
artists, philosophers, and writers who describe our times as at least partly
those of Martin Heidegger. The Steiner style is not derailed by the dense
metaphysics of Heidegger; he ends his book, " Martin Heidegger is the
great master of astonishment, the man whose amazement before the blank

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fact that we are instead of not being, has put a radiant obstacle in the path
of the obvious " (p. 158) .
As an introduction to Heidegger, however, the book only partly succeeds.
There is not enough of what Steiner does well-sketching the personal and
cultural history surrounding a great mind-and there is not enough of
Heidegger. Despite the enthusiastic beginning and ending, a negative tone
belonging to criticism rather than introduction pervades. No matter how
vivid is the presentation of the Heideggerian passacaglia of Being and being,
one cannot escape the feeling that Steiner is not a philosopher nor a scholar
in Western metaphysics. (The author describes himself as a Kulturkritiker.)
The book begins by locating Heidegger's place in culture, indicating the
philosopher's potential to draw adulation and ridicule; it concludes by looking at the lasting "Presence of Heidegger." Two central chapters, "Some
Basic Terms " and " Being and Time," are devoted to the presentation of
Heidegger's thought. The weakness of the book appears quickly, for its
view of Heidegger, its perception of his development, is largely the approach
of English-speaking writers working before 1963. Then Heidegger was an
"existentialist," a "nihilist," a "Bultmannian," whose critique of metaphysics was a lonely, secular anthropology and psychology. This picture of
Heidegger, never widespread in Germany where his oeuvre and hearers kept
before the public his ontological roots, held sway in England, the United
States and even in France. For the English-speaking world, William Richardson's book of 1963 marked a turning point: it situated Being and Time
within a struggle for a new ontology, a meditation on temporality, and an
employment of poetry. Steiner, by devoting so much of his book to retelling
Sein und Zeit, presents an incomplete picture of Heidegger. Using the Letter
on Humanism as a bridge between chapters two and three is only a further
illustration of a truncated portrait of the philosopher.
What Steiner presents of Heidegger is the thinker's middle period. He
does not treat the early works on Husserl and Kant, and on Scotus and
Eckhart, the selection of temporality as central, or the re-establishment of
Being and its presence in culture, poetry, and language. It is surprising that
the Kulturkritiker did not spend more time on Heidegger's theory of temporality as the periodization of cultures; in a way, it is the core and finale of
Being and Time. Steiner omits the Heidegger who is cousin to Zen and
critic of Western technology. Steiner finds Heidegger's contemplative,
ascetical adherence to remaining in one place and one professorship to be
theatrical, "an addendum to a school of anger and reverie." When I first
read Die Technik in 1966, I had a similar reaction. Now, with two of New
York City's boroughs largely in ruins and the farms of the Midwest lambs
vulnerable to the wolves of industry, I am not so sure that familiarity with
homeland and enduring relationship are either antique or Nazi.
But Steiner brings insights. He compares the opacity and ordinariness
of Heidegger's language with Expressionist painting. The section on the

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philosopher's relationship to Nazism raises new points. Steiner poignantly
asks about Heidegger's silence after 1945 rather than about his unclear actions of earlier years, and he points out the similarity of the language of
Being and Time's psychological ethics to Nazi jargon. Did Heidegger, who
in his egoism could identify his thought as the denouement of a tradition
reaching back through Hegel to Plato and who identified the thought of
the West with Greek and German ontology, become aware that Germany's
destiny had proven to be not only positive but negative? The negative
dialectic of Hegel had found empirical verification all too soon: for Bach,
a Hitler. The later Heidegger perhaps saw himself not as one charting the
triumph of culture and thinking but as an existent caught up in the tidal
waves of time and being expressed through language in ways beyond his
control.
The book ends with the mind-set of the 1950s: Heidegger along with
Marxism may be a " meta-theology " ... but certainly not, miserably, a
"mysticism." To recent scholars we owe a richer reading of Heidegger.
John Caputo's book suggests a new perspective for viewing Heidegger,
wider than Kierkegaard or Bultmann, deeper than Sartre or Wittgenstein.
It is the perspective of Meister Eckhart, one who, Heidegger said early in
his career, united the metaphysical tradition of the West with its mystical
counterpart.
THOMAS F. O'MEARA, O.P.
University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame, Indiana

Divine Commands and Morality. Edited by PAUL HELMS. New York: Oxford University Press, 1981. Pp. 186. Paper $7.95.
This work is a collection of papers dealing with the question whether
moral precepts are dependent on divine commands for their justification. I
shall only consider some of the papers in this volume.
William Frankena holds that morality is not logically dependent on religion or revelation for complete human fulfillment to be established. There
may be psychological, historical, or motivational dependencies, but there
cannot be a relationship of logical dependence among these. He would not
disagree that all moral claims are justified ultimately by theology, but to
say this makes the notion of religion vacuous. Frankena fails to give a clear
explanation of what he means by a "logical dependence", and his argument is hampered by his consideration of religion in purely formal
terms without any reference to the material content of either religion or
morality. One must be very cautious in claiming that there is not any
logical relationship of dependence between religion and morality on account

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BOOK REVIEWS

of the intricate nature of morality as a product of the practical reason. The
logical character of practical reasoning is very complex, and it may be too
hasty to say that there is no dependency between this mode of reasoning
and revelation. For there seems to be a dependence of morality on religion
in the sense that true religious doctrines will not only provide the source
and end of morality but also give a clarity, coherence, and consistency to
morality in providing these ultimate dimensions. The truth of this can be
seen by examining the specific content of various religious doctrines and
moral precepts. For so doing will show how specific precepts are linked and
also how the ultimate effects, sources, and meanings of these precepts are
consistently and coherently joined.
James Rachels argues that God cannot be proven to exist because as a
perfect being God would violate the autonomy of moral agents by His
commands and could not be a fitting object of praise. Rather than proving
that God does not exist, this argument seems to prove that any act of
praise is logically incoherent and demeaning because it implies the inferiority and dependence of the one giving praise. Rachels misunderstands the relationship between the dictates of conscience to divine commands when he
assumes that God tricks moral agents by speaking through conscience and
giving the illusion of self-government. Conscience is not just an internal
loudspeaker through which God issues his commands to agents. The dictates of conscience are conclusions of practical reason which itself directs
agents to the good. Practical reason naturally apprehends the human good
to which the agent is inclined by nature and which brings integral human
fulfillment. This dictate of practical reason specifies what is to be done to
realize the good in question. God " speaks through " conscience only in that
the good to which God directs the agent is also the good to which the agent
is directed by his practical reason in conscience. The agent is not manipulated by God, for both the agent's conscience and the commands of God
are directing the agent to the goods that bring integral human fulfillment.
Divine omnipotence and divine goodness are mutually exclusive concepts
in the thought of Nelson Pike. He suggests that God cannot bring about
the consistently describable state of affairs where an innocent young girl
starves to death and remain perfect or not bring it about and remain omnipotent. This theory must be faulted on a number of accounts. It is not
clear what counts as a "consistently describable" state of affairs for God
and for man. Pike assumes that the evil of the young girl's situation is an
entity or a positive state of affairs
can be created, rather than a
deprivation of a positive state of affairs. He seems to assume that evils are
the effects of creative power, and that the incapacity of God to bring evils
into existence is a lack of a due power in God. His notion of evil as a state
that would cause an agent to be termed morally reprehensible is too vague
a definition to be helpful.
R. G. Swinburne makes the excellent point that it is God's omniscence

BOOK REVIEWS

389

that imposes restraints on his action. As a man is limited in acting to jump
to the moon because he knows it to be impossible, so also is God restrained
from acting so as to bring about evil because he knows this to be impossible.
Baruch Brody argues that obedience is due to God because He exercises a
form of ownership over His creatures on account of His role as creator.
This view suggests that the moral duty of obedience is based on a nonmoral property of creatorship. It would seem to be more logically consistent to ground obedience on the goodness and perfection of God, as these
are moral properties. The basis of the obligation to obedience is beyond
ownership. Agents are to obey because the acts which God commands are
acts which bring integral human fulfillment, whereas obedience to God as
a type of property holder does not in and of itself bring this fulfillment.
Fulfillment only comes from something extrinsic to the relationship of
property.
Peter Geach holds that the knowledge of God is not a prerequisite for
having any moral knowledge. He does suggest, however, that it is necessary
to have religious knowledge if one is to see that one cannot do evil so that
good may come of it, for the evil action that is done will be punished by
God. This is not to be disputed, but it is not certain that all moral knowledge can come without revelation. For if revelation does reveal the source
and end of moral action in its ultimate dimensions, and thus provides a
coherence, unity, and consistency to moral knowledge, new moral content
has then been added by revelation.
In addition to the works referred to in the bibliography, readers should be
aware of such works as I. M. Bochenski's The Logic of Religion, which indirectly deals with the question of the justification of religious discourse,
and also the classical works on grace and free will. Although indirectly
related to the issues dealt with in this book, the insights in the classical
tracts on the grace and free will debate might provide further insight into
the topics discussed here.
The essays collected here are of uneven quality, but the work is helpful
for gaining insight into current issues concerning the relation of religion
and morality.
ROBERT BARRY, O.P.

Dominican House of Studies
Wa8hington, D.0.

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BOOK REVIEWS

The Problem of Self-Love in St. Augustine. By OLIVER O'DoNOVAN. New
Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1980. Pp. 221. $14.00.
Those who are already familiar with Anders Nygren's Agape and Eros
and John Burnaby's Amor Dei: A Study of the Religion of St. Augustine
will most likely also be interested in this smaller volume that deals with the
same controverted issue of the precise nature of the role of self-love in
the thought of Augustine. If what Nygren says is true (and it may very
well be)-that Augustine's view of love
even puts the New Testament view of love in the shade. New Testament texts
continue to form the basis of discussion, but they are interpreted in accordance
with Augustine. Ever since his time the meaning of Christian love has generally
been expressed in the categories he created, and even the emotional quality
which it bears is largely due to him (Agape and Eros, p. 450)-

then perhaps the amount of ink spilt in clarifying the thought of the great
Father of the West is not in vain.
As O'Donovan points out at the beginning of his book, it is Augustine,
quite alone, who is responsible for the currency of the term " self-love " in
Western theology; and where mention of the concept before him in the West
could be numbered on the fingers of one hand, in Augustine's writings it
appears dozens of times. However, he does not always employ the expression in exactly the same way, and consequently it can mean either ultimate
concern for self or ultimate unconcern for self, in both of which cases it can
also be translated as "self-hatred "-whether of the beneficial or the nonbeneficial kind.
Because of the predominance of the theme of self-love in Augustine,
O'Donovan suggests that his ethics may be characterized as self-referential.
From here he launches into an investigation of the relationship between
self-love on the one hand and love of God and of neighbor on the other. To
what extent should self-love, can self-love, be abstracted from these other
two loves? The perennial problem in Augustine has been (although it must
be mentioned that the problem exists far more for the Reformed than for
the Roman Catholic tradition) , of course, that there is simply no conceiving of either of the other two loves without self-love. As we read in De
doctrina christiana I, 82, 85 (a passage not cited by O'Donovan): "When
we show mercy to someone and care for him it is for his well-being that we
do it and consider it; but in some way or other our own [well-being] also
follows, since God does not leave the mercy that we show to someone in
need without its reward. But this is the_ highest reward-that we should
enjoy him. . . ."
In the end, after elaborating some undoubted difficulties and inconsistencies in Augustine's thought, O'Donovan comes to the conclusion that
the problem is above all semantic and that it is Augustine's language that
is at issue. Does the language of self-love not somehow endanger the stark-

BOOK REVIEWS

341

ness of the gospel call to love under the most adverse circumstances? To
this O'Donovan replies that we must opt either for a language, as Augustine
does, that expresses some proportionality between the here and the hereafter but is bound to be halting or for a language that does not-which
would ultimately mean silence. Augustine's fault, then, would have been
simply to have expressed himself at all on the subject of the love of God,
neighbor and self!
BONIFACE RAMSEY, O.P.
Dominican Home of Studies
Washington, D.0.

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